Necessary change is coming

Today, US Senator Dick Durnin (D-Illinois), who is also the Democratic Whip in the US Senate, announced he won’t seek re-election next year. I think Senator Durbin has made the right choice. He said, “in my heart I know it’s time to pass the torch,” and I think he’s right. I voted for Senator Durbin all five times, but he’s right: It’s time for a new generation to take the lead.

To be transparent, of course I’ll vote for whoever the Democratic nominee is—assuming I’m still allowed to vote next year (the Republicans’ “SAVE Act”, as written, will probably end up taking away my right to vote). Even so, in my past, I did once vote for a Republican for Senator from Illinois, Charles H. Percy, way back in 1978, the first Federal election I was old enough to vote in. By 1984, I’d been pushed out of the Republican Party by Reagan’s takeover and the party’s lurch to the Right (which is ironic these days because Reaganism would be called “socialism” or “Marxism” by today’s Republicans). So, in 1984, I voted for Senator Paul Simon, and Simon, in turn, was succeeded by Durbin. I talked more about Senator Percy in a 2011 post when he died. And one of the things I praised in that post was that “he pushed for repatriation of the Panama Canal back to Panama”, which underscores how awful the modern US Republican Party has become—and why there’s no why, no how, I coule ever even imagine voting for a Republican for any office.

Senator Durbin did a LOT of good over his career, something many others will point out in great detail. But: He also earned outrage form the Democratic base for his vote for the Continuing Resolution that funded the current White House regime’s criminal acts, something that Senate Minotry Leader, Chuck Schumer (D-NY) also was widely criticised for. He, however, has not announced his retirement (his current term as Senator expires in 2028, when he’ll be 77).

So, what happens now? There will, of course, be a scramble among Democratic politicians in Illinois to rise to the top of the heap of potential successors. The Chicago Sun-Time has reported on the leading contenders, most of whom I don’t know anything about [Tip o’ the Hat to Roger Green for the link]. However, in general I’m not keen on any US Representative running for Senate (or any other office) if that would turn the seat into a competitive election. I firmly believe that no incumbent Democratic US Representative should run for another office if doing so could risk losing the seat to Republicans. Saving the republic and preserving, protecting, and defending the Constitution is far more important than any politician’s personal ambitions. IMHO.

There’s a lot of pressure on Democratic politicians in Congress to either stand up or stand down. Senator Dick Durbin has chosen the latter, and I completely support his decision and acknowledge the courage it must’ve taken to step aside from a job he clearly loves. Sometimes the most difficult decision is the best one.

The photo above is a cropped version of Senator Durbin's official portrait from 2020, which is in the Public Domain. It's available from Wikimedia Commons.

The day before Thanksgiving

You can take the boy out of the USA, but... It's Thursday here in New Zealand, so time for my annual turkey sandwich. 😊 I'm actually doing a mini Thanksgiving Dinner tomorrow, something I don't often do. Otherwise, I'd probably have had my sandwich tomorrow. #expatlife #AmeriNZ #thanksgiving 🇺🇸🇳🇿🇺🇸🇳🇿 🦃

A photo posted by arthur_amerinz (@arthur_amerinz) on Nov 23, 2016 at 3:35pm PST

This is a first: A post in which I’m sharing not one, but TWO Instagram photos! That’s because they’re both from today, and both about Thanksgiving. Well, the day before Thanksgiving.

Today is the fourth Thursday in November, which, of course, means absolutely nothing in this part of the world. In my American homeland, that Thursday is Thanksgiving, but that’s also tomorrow their time. It gets confusing even for me: Which day should I celebrate? I’ve often had a turkey sandwich on this particular Thursday, as I did today (the packaging has changed since I last did this back in 2014). As it happens, I will be making a Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow, and that’s why both of these photos are relevant.

After my turkey sandwich lunch, I headed out to the store to get a few supplies, including tinned pumpkin. Only one grocery chain, Countdown, carries it, saving me a special trip to Martha’s Backyard. And that’s where the problems began.

Countdown has a smartphone App I wanted to check to see which area store carried the pumpkin. I had to update the App first. Then, I checked and the area stores did have them.

So, I went to my usual Countdown, and couldn’t find them. They’ve always been in the “International” section, in the part where imported American products are stocked in small quantities. So, I asked at the service desk and the kind lady checked, and their computer did, indeed, show they had some. She went with me to where they were supposed to be, and there was nothing. Then I noticed the price was on the shelf, but there was no stock—they’d spread out marshmallow spread to fill the shelf. She checked in back, but they couldn’t find any there, either.

So, off I went to another Countdown in a local mall (that has two—which is long story). I wandered around, couldn’t find and it was just about to give up, when—Boom!—there they were, and many cans, too (also in that store’s American area of their International section).

So, I grabbed a couple cans (and checked the expiry date…), and as I was putting them in the trolley, I noticed what was on the top of one. The photo of that is below.

I said on Instagram that I was briefly homesick, and that’s actually true: Seeing that on the top of the can of pumpkin I was buying so I could make pies for Thanksgiving was enough to give me “the feels”. And then I went and finished my shopping.

So, I now have all my supplies, and tomorrow will be a busy day. But at least I finally have my tinned pumpkin, and I had my traditional turkey sandwich. Jeez, all that AND beautiful weather, this was a great day, this day before Thanksgiving.

So, I found tinned pumpkin at the second Countdown I went to (the only chain that stocks it), I grab one, and what do I see on the top? Sniff. Briefly homesick. #expatlife #thanksgivingnz

A photo posted by arthur_amerinz (@arthur_amerinz) on Nov 23, 2016 at 7:17pm PST

The Illinois Primary

The Illinois Primary will be held on March 15, and this year it might actually matter, which is the point of the video above. The primary will be just two weeks after “Super Tuesday”, and if the race remains tight, Illinois may see some campaigning. That’s good news.

Illinois will select 156 committed delegates on March 15, and when combined with the other states selecting delegates that day (Florida, Missouri, North Carolina, and Ohio), a total of 691 pledged delegates will be selected. That works out to about 17% of all the pledged delegates to the Democratic National Convention.

On Super Tuesday, Democrats will select 812 pledged delegates, or around 20% of all the delegates—not all that far ahead of “Little Super Tuesday”, as we could call March 15. A further 319 pledged delegates will be selected between March 1 and March 15, meaning 1822 pledged delegates will be selected in the first two weeks of March, or about 45% of all the delegates. March is clearly an important month.

A couple points about those numbers: They refer only to delegates committed to a candidate, and doesn’t include officially uncommitted delegates, usually so-called “Super Delegates”. In addition, I couldn’t find any specific delegate counts by date, and had to add them up myself from numbers listed on the Wikipedia article, “Democratic Party presidential primaries, 2016”. However, arithmetic is NOT my strong suit, so if you happen to double check me and find an error, please feel free to let me know in the comments.

Illinois is generally classed as an open primary, because voters can vote in any party primary being held on the day. In Illinois, unlike some other states, voters don’t declare a party preference when registering to vote. However, voters do need to publicly request the ballot of a party, so I’d call Illinois’ a “mostly open” primary.

The way the primary is conducted is stupid. Voters choose who they want to be their party’s nominee in what is derisively called a “beauty contest”. That’s because it’s nothing but a taxpayer-funded opinion poll of those voting in the primary—good for PR value, probably, maybe it’s even a psychological boost, but nothing else. Instead, voters vote for committed delegates running in their Congressional District.

In my Congressional District, there are 7 delegates to be selected, but candidates can slate more than seven (Sanders has 8). However, not all candidates, especially minor candidates, are able to mount a full slate of delegate candidates in all Congressional Districts. For example, in my Congressional District Martin O’Malley has only one delegate candidate (he withdrew too late to be removed from the ballot). So, it’s possible for a candidate to win the “beauty contest”, but come in way behind in delegates elected. This is just plain nuts and should be changed (and reform is a topic in itself).

I personally know two of the delegate candidates—one for Clinton and one for Sanders. I like them both, too. I’ve at least heard of two more of Clinton’s delegate candidates, and none of Sanders’. However, most people vote for all of the delegates committed to their preferred candidate, and don’t pay attention to who, specifically, is running. I’m still undecided about who I’ll vote for in the “beauty contest”, and so, their delegates, but I may vote for one delegate for whoever the other candidate ends up being, just because I know him. I know, I know: I’m such a rebel.

Putting the silliness of the way in which the Illinois Primary is held aside, the fact that its results may actually matter is good news for the state and region (since Missouri and Ohio are the same day). Sure, there’s the attention the state gets, and some media dollars and other campaign expenditures thrown its way, but the real benefit is that Illinois voters will be able to evaluate candidates more closely than they usually get to do. That’s why all this is a good thing.

The video up top features Dr. John S. Jackson, Visiting Professor at the Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. Dr. Jackson was one of my political science professors when I was an undergraduate at SIU, and one of the best I had. He later became the Dean of the College of Liberal Arts, which is the last time I saw him, and a few other positions before becoming the 17th Chancellor of SIU later still. He’s obviously much older than my mental image, but it was great to see he’s still working in the field.

Now, all I have to do is make up my mind and vote.

The video above is from WSIL-TV in Southern Illinois 

The annual increasing number: 57

Birthdays have always been a sort of personal New Year for me, a chance to re-boot and refresh. It’s also when I reflect on the increasing number of years behind me. This year, I’m especially aware of those years already past, even as I continue to look forward—always forward.

Last year, I lost three friends and former colleagues from my activist days in Chicago (Ninure, Bill, and Kit). They were spaced out over the year, but the third, Kit, was just last month. This month, three singers (Natalie Cole, David Bowie and Glenn Frey) who were part of my youth, one quite important, died, as did an actor (Alan Rickman) I admired very much. It was all—a bit much. And yet, it also made me realise how much I still have—people I love, admire, and/or respect, reminders of important parts of my life, and plenty of goals yet to achieve. Always forward.

Life ought to be about constantly moving forward, I think, and while I also think it’s important to take time to remember the significant people, places, and things that are no longer part of our lives (for whatever reason), the important thing is to keep going, keep striving, keep reaching. And I do.

I started this blog nearly ten years ago as a means of self-expression. It’s the same reason I later started podcasting and, more recently, making videos. None of them will ever make me any money, but that was never the point: It was the journey, and learning new things and skills, that’s always mattered to me, and that was its own reward. It still is.

But all of this self-expression has a useful point far more important than any monetary gain: I can remember things I’d otherwise forget. I talked about that last year:

…I’ve also become increasingly aware as the years pile up of how important it is to record all sorts of things that mark progress through life. Memory isn’t anywhere near as reliable as many people assume, but it tends to become less reliable as the years pass. I sometimes joke that I’ve forgotten more than I knew as an 18 year old. That’s an exaggeration, of course, but maybe not as big a one as I might hope.

These annual posts—along with ordinary posts about ordinary things—serve as a sort of institutional memory, a kind of “Arthur Cloud”. But they also do more: These posts help me remember things I’ve forgotten, or they might inspire me to reflect on memories that maybe I hadn’t examined before. Those are good things, too.

For me, all that is beyond any monetary value. It’s a way of keeping and holding those ethereal things—memories, the importance of a person now gone—and keeping them within their context. Moving forward is so much easier when you know where you’ve been.

Back in 2012, I first used road signs with the same number as my age to illustrate these birthday posts. Last year’s wasn’t particularly relevant, as I noted in the footnote, but this year’s is highly relevant: I drove on Interstate 57 (I-57) more than on any other highway in the USA.

I-57 is the longest Interstate in Illinois, and it’s the route I took to get to and from Southern Illinois University (SIU), my alma mater. The speed limit was 55mph in those days, and assuming I stuck to the speed limit (which I mostly did…) and didn’t stop much, the drive took between six and seven hours. I can’t imagine driving that long non-stop now, but it didn’t seem like a big deal when I was in my late teens and early 20s.

Illinois Route 13 connected I-57 to Carbondale, where SIU is located, running right through the city. It always seemed like the longest part of the trip (the road continues on to the St. Louis area).

I-57—and, I’m sure, Illinois 13—have changed since I drove them so much in the late 1970s/early 1980s. So have the towns and cities the roads connect, and so have I. But those roads are seared into my memory, not just from the frequency I travelled along them, but for what they symbolically connected: My childhood and early life, to the start of my adult path in life that led, ultimately, to who and where I am today. Is it any wonder, then, that I see life as a kind of highway, too?

For me, birthdays are the day I remember all the important people and things that have been important parts of my life, but as I also put it last year, “I get to forget all the bad stuff, and instead think of the good: What I have (especially my Nigel, family and friends), as well as what may yet come my way.”

Even now, as the years pile up, and even after a few too many recent reminders of how short life really is, I’m excited about the road ahead. Always forward. Always.

The Interstate 57 sign is a public domain graphic available from Wikimedia Commons. There’s also an Illinois Route 57, but as far as I can remember, I’ve never been on it. The photo of the sign for Illinois Route 13 is also in the public domain and from Wikimedia Commons.

My Previous Birthday posts:
2015: The annual increasing number: 56
2014: The annual increasing number: 55
2013: The annual increasing number: 54
2012: The annual increasing number
2011: The annual increasing number
2010: The annual increasing number
2009: Happy Birthday to Me…
2008: Another Birthday

Remembering Kit Duffy

Kit Duffy in April.

This morning, I was working on a new post and decided to go to the original source, which was on Facebook. I arrived just minutes after the official announcement that a dear friend and former colleague from my activist days, Kit Duffy, had died. I was frozen for quite a few minutes.

This post is a revised and extended version of what I posted on my personal Facebook.

Kit had recently had heart surgery and had several complications. One of her friends visited her in hospital and posted updates to Kit’s timeline, which meant all her friends could be kept up to date. Things didn’t seem to be going well, and I feared that she might not make it. She apparently died peacefully, which is what we all hope for when our time comes.

I met Kit when Chicago's Mayor Harold Washington appointed her as his liaison to the city's LGBT communities, and through her work she practically copyrighted the term "straight ally". Since I was a grassroots LGBT activist at the time, our paths crossed MANY times. We had a lot of wonderful chats during those years, and I learned so much from her: She wasn't just a friend, she was an important mentor, as she was for so many activists in that era.

More recently, we reconnected on Facebook, as I have with so many old friends, and we shared a lot of fun and laughs along the way. I am so very grateful for that, and so sad that we never had the chance to meet up again in real life.

She was a very important part of the struggle for the civil and human rights of LGBT Chicagoans, and throughout the state. "Kit's fingerprints are on almost everything we have in the gay community in Illinois today," another former activist colleague, Rick Garcia, said for Kit’s obituary in Windy City Times. "I really think that she is the midwife of the successes we have in Illinois,” he added. I agree.

She was a friend to so many, and she was respected even by people who disagreed with her politics, which is a testament to her, I think, and so very rare these days. She was one of a kind, and I honestly don't think we'll see someone like her again.

I'll miss Kit terribly, but I'm happy that she didn't suffer.

Farewell, my friend—and thank you for everything.

The photo of Kit above is a cropped version of a photo she posted on Facebook last April, as she took part of Chicago’s mayoral election. She remained true to her progressive politics and values to the very end.

See also: “Kit Duffy, liaison for change”, part of Windy City Times’ AIDS@30 series.

When the ‘good guys’ are wrong

Recently, Roger Green has sent me links to several things he knew I’d be interested in, which isn’t unusual; sometimes I send him links, too. Yesterday’s post was inspired by something he sent me, and today’s is based on another. It turned out, however, that this post is about what can be wrong with the Left’s political discourse: Lack of accuracy. We MUST be better than our adversaries each and every time.

The piece Roger sent me was about Democratic Illinois US Representative Dan Lipinski, written by David Nir for Daily Kos: “This Democrat sits in a blue seat—and he wants to amend the constitution to ban same-sex marriage”. There was a lot wrong with it, and it was typical of what frustrates me so much about commentary on the Left.

The piece says:

“According to a 2014 candidate questionnaire put out by the conservative Illinois Family Institute and just unearthed by the Washington Blade, [Dan] Lipinski supports an amendment to the constitution that would outlaw same-sex marriage.”

That’s true, but hardly news: The Illinois “Family” Institute [sic] is a notorious far-right anti-gay activist group that routinely ranks politicians. The fact that the Washington Blade only just now found out what Illinois folks knew (or could have known) in 2014 doesn’t suddenly make it news. The Blade’s own report also points out that very often Lipinski votes “present” rather than actually voting against the LGBT people of his district, which hardly makes him an evil monster.

Nir continues:

“What's really insulting is that Lipinski represents a solidly blue district in the Chicago area that Obama won by 56-43 margin, so Democrats can and should do better. Pathetically, the establishment has long propped up Lipinski, even going so far as to remove the home a potential primary challenger from his district back in 2011. (Lipinski's father, Bill, was also a congressman; he handed his seat to his son years ago by retiring after the filing deadline.)”

Let’s unpack that. First, it’s absolutely true that the Chicago and Cook County Democratic establishment DOES prop up Lipinski, and plenty of folks in Illinois Democratic politics are plenty pissed off about that. But it’s entirely irrelevant.

What Nir and the Blade both ignore is that Lipinksi’s district is very conservative, and has been for decades (I lobbied his old man, Bill, and had him marked as not supporting LGBT issues). The district IS Democratic: It’s voted for a Democrat for US Representative for most the past 55 years, and it’s also voted for the Democratic presidential nominee in the last six elections. However, the district was also one of only two (out of nine) Chicago Congressional Districts to vote for Reagan in 1980. They did it again in 1984, and then for Bush the First in 1988.

Rather than having mainstream Democrats as neighbouring districts do, Lipinski’s district is made up of what Chicagoans used to call “white ethnics”, folks also once called “Reagan Democrats”: Nominally Democratic, mostly working class white people who are very socially conservative (and often conservative religionists).

What all this means is that even though the Democratic establishment propped up the Lipinskis, a true progressive Democrat is unlikely to do well in that conservative district. A more progressive Democrat could do okay there—but they’d be unlikely, statistically speaking, to topple an incumbent: In most districts, challengers are unlikely to defeat an incumbent of their own party, and that’s true of both parties. In an open primary with no incumbent, a less conservative Democrat would have a chance, but only just.

All of this is knowable stuff. If Nir or the Blade had done a little research—hell, they could have consulted Wikipedia for a very accurate look at the district—they would have known that Dan Lipinski mostly reflects his district, and that's why he’s outside mainstream Democratic Party values.

So, Nir and the Blade made a political argument not related to the facts, then compounded that with something that’s too common at the farther ends (Left and Right) of political discourse, namely, to declare that because a thing was true once, it must always be true. To me, that’s just plain silly.

Yes, for the 2014 elections Lipinksi backed a constitutional amendment to ban marriage equality, and that’s a reprehensible thing. However, two things about that: We don’t know—and neither Daily Kos nor the Blade suggested—that it’s still Lipinski’s position following the US Supreme Court ruling mandating 50-state marriage equality; it seems unlikely that he’d still back that now. At most, he might back a “let states decide” amendment, something that wouldn't affect his own LGBT constituents, since the Illinois legislature already passed marriage equality—Illinois did decide.

The other important thing here is that it’s impossible for a Constitutional Amendment banning marriage equality to happen: That ship sank decades ago. So, backing such an amendment is merely pandering to his socially conservative voters. Sure, it’s vile and not what a real Democrat would do, but neither is it the greatest threat to the republic or even the Democratic Party that we’ve ever seen.

I have one serious concern about Lipinski, though: His sponsorship of the pro-discrimination “First Amendment Defense Act” which seeks to specifically permit anti-gay discrimination by anyone who claims they have supposedly “sincerely held religious beliefs” mandating discrimination against LGBT people.

Let me be clear: I truly wish that a real Democrat would challenge Lipinski and knock him out; it disgusts me that a rightwing, anti-gay politician like him can claim to be a Democrat and get away with the fraud. Illinois, the 3rd District, the Democratic Party, and the US House all deserve a real Democrat, and not a fraud like Dan. However, the voters in that district clearly have other ideas, and it’s their right to elect whomever they want. Whether I think he’s a fuckwit is totally irrelevant. So is the opinion of Daily Kos, the Washington Blade, HRC, or anyone else.

So, my concern here isn’t really about the DINO Dan Lipinski, but rather about sites on the Left ignoring facts—knowable things—to try and score partisan political points without reference to facts, context, or any of the other reality-based tools that they should be using.

This matters because the rightwing media in the USA uses lies, smears, defamation, and distortion with giddy abandon in order to score partisan political points—especially on LGBT issues. Media on the Left must always go out of its way to be better than the Right—more accurate, more factual, and paying attention to context.

We MUST be better than our adversaries each and every time.

When a friend leaves

This morning when I logged on to Facebook, there was a message waiting. My friend Grant wanted to let me and a mutual friend of ours, Vernon, know that a woman who had been one of our activist colleagues in Chicago had died. Bad way to start a day.

Ninure Saunders lost her battle with cancer that morning (Chicago time), apparently, after what had been a valiant, though long and tiring, struggle. When I didn’t see any new posts on Facebook for quite some time, I suspected that she might not be doing well, though I had no idea who to contact to ask.

Ninure and I met more than 30 years ago—in 1982—when we both worked at a telemarketing firm. We became friends, and she and I, and another guy we worked with and became friends with, would sometimes get together for drinks after work. At the time, I really didn’t know many other people in the city.

She’d been plagued by health problems her whole life, including arthritis that gave her a lot of pain and eventually led to her needing a walking stick. She also had bad eyesight, and was pretty much legally blind, though she did have sight.

One night after work, she and our friend and I were hanging out at my tiny apartment. We were drinking vodka and Kool-Aid (hey—don’t judge: I was in my early 20s!). For some reason I still don’t really understand, we thought it would be a good idea for her to mix the drinks for us. The euphemism “over served” was a bit of an understatement, and it was the only time in my life when I was drinking and lost time. We laughed about that for years afterward.

Sometime later, we both volunteered for the Illinois Gay and Lesbian Task Force, the grassroots organisation I gave many years to and have mentioned before. We eventually both became officers—me treasurer, then secretary, she was membership director then female co-chair.

There are many stories from those days, not all of them pleasant, of course—war stories never are all positive—but I think another friend from that era, Tim, summed it up well on Facebook:

“Our old Illinois Gay & Lesbian Task Force group from the 70s & 80s keeps getting smaller. When we, all of us, weren't driving each other nuts, we could unite and battle like nothing you've ever seen. Not bad for a rag tag bunch of volunteers. Wonderful memories. What a fighter she was. RIP.”

And she WAS a fighter—and an effective one. She contributed to far too many victories to count, and was passionate about justice and fairness. She had a quick wit, a warm openness (she loved hugs) and was a great person to have in-depth political discussions with.

She was also a devout Christian, one of the areas where we diverged, even then. I was still a Christian in the early years of our friendship, but not like she was. More importantly, she also lived her Christianity to the best of her abilities, and it informed her commitment to social justice.

One time around the mid-1980s, I was complaining about some religious right person saying or doing something awful against LGBT people (some things don’t change…), and I said that the guy clearly wasn’t a real Christian. She gently chided me: “You can’t know what’s in his heart,” she said, adding that he might come right, basically. I took that advice to heart for decades, and really only changed in recent times when I noticed that radical right folks who called themselves Christian were condemning mainline Christians (my own background) as being “fake”. Times change.

We changed, too, and drifted apart in the very late 1980s, though we eventually became friendly again in the 1990s, then even later, friends on Facebook. So, I was aware of her declining health, though she clearly didn’t want to dwell on it.

I miss those early days, and especially the early days of our activism. It was all still fun and exciting back then, even if we tended to lose more battles than we won. Tim’s right: We really COULD “unite and battle like nothing you've ever seen”, and also laugh about it all. It kept us from despair.

So, goodbye, Ninure. I’m sorry we never got the chance to have one last hug, but at least your pain and suffering have ended. I’m grateful for the fun times we had together, and I thank you for making my life better. I may not share your religious beliefs, but I’ll say the closest appropriate thing I can sincerely say, quoting from the late Irish comedian Dave Allen: "Thank you, goodnight and may your God go with you." She would have appreciated that.

The photo of Ninure up top is from Facebook, though I have no idea who took it. I'd use one of my own, but I'm not sure where my photos from those days are at the moment. If I find them, I'll probably change the photo to one of my own.

The next fronts in the USA’s ‘culture wars’

People could be forgiven for thinking that the rightwing’s “culture war” against the USA is about to end. After all, the Supreme Court is widely expected to soon strike down all the remaining bans on marriage equality in US states. However, the next front in the rightwing’s war is already open.

The map above from the Human Rights Campaign shows the 85 anti-LGBT bills introduced in 26 state legislatures (the report is available as a PDF). The report documents the staggering number of anti-LGBT bills introduced, and while some will be defeated or already have been, others have been, or are likely to be, passed. There will be more of the same next year, and every year thereafter for years to come.

The radical right religionists’ have several goals, but their legislative goal is clear and simple: Overturn all laws protecting LGBT people from discrimination, and they have two distinct strategies to accomplish that. One strategy is to pass state laws that forbid localities from passing human rights laws that are more protective than that state’s law. The HRC notes that some 34 million Americans live in states in which localities are more protective than their state is (this was once true in my native Illinois, where for decades various local governments protected LGBT people, but the state didn’t). Interestingly, in embracing this tactic, the radical right religionists are actually finally admitting that in states that don’t protect their LGBT people, it’s perfectly legal to discriminate against us, and they don’t even need any kind of reason or excuse to do so. This is in stark contradiction of their previous adamant declaration that a special right to discriminate was needed.

The second, higher profile, legislative strategy is to enact so called “religious freedom” laws to legalise discrimination against LGBT people—that special right to discriminate they’ve demanded ever since the tide turned in the battle for marriage equality. The radical right has always lied that discrimination isn’t their intent when, of course, it absolutely is their sole intent.

The licence to discriminate bills, as the “religious freedom” laws are more accurately known, allows the radical right to be extra harsh against LGBT people in places where it’s already legal to discriminate, something they want for ideological reasons. But their cynical branding also puts a paper-thin veil of respectability on their attempts to take away the civil and human rights of LGBT people. That veil allows the radical right to hoodwink otherwise fair-minded people (and politicians) into thinking it actually DOES have something to do with “religious freedom” when the actual intent is to enshrine anti-LGBT animus into law.

In addition to proposing anti-LGBT laws, radical right religionists are also organising themselves to “defy” the Supreme Court in unspecified ways. For example, a group of “pastors” recently heard speakers tell them to be prepared for “martyrdom” in their culture wars fight, mostly against LGBT people. This message is being repeated throughout the radical right echo chamber.

A group of far-right “Christians” says it’s organising members of the US Congress who will pledge to go to jail in defiance of the expected Supreme Court ruling on marriage equality, even though Congress has nothing whatsoever to do with issuing marriage licenses in any US state. The radicals ignore that pesky detail, probably because they think such a list would have good propaganda value in their culture war (of course, it would also be good propaganda value for the radicals' mainstream adversaries…).

The defiance threat (supposedly) from members of Congress stops well short of the five year old “Manhattan Declaration: A Call of Christian Conscience” in which a veritable who’s who of far right anti-gay religious activists and hate group leaders pledged civil disobedience to actively defy laws and court orders they don’t like, including on marriage equality, which is why it was cited in a RICO lawsuit.

We’ll see all these tactics and many more in the coming years, especially the so-called “religious freedom” laws to legalise anti-LGBT discrimination, but also efforts to restrict and even repeal the civil and human rights of LGBT people, as well as attempts to enshrine bigotry against transgendered people, and even more bills attempting to advance “conversion therapy” torture.

Fortunately, in some places the radical right is meeting determined resistance. Some of their bills are being voted down, and some places are even outlawing “conversion therapy” torture of minors, all of which is good. But the radical right is persistent, extremely well-funded, and has legions of fanatical followers who will do whatever is asked of them. So, despite resistance from decent, fair-minded people, this war is far from over.

The first step in defeating the radical right’s “culture war” against the USA, and LGBT people in particular, is to shine the harsh light of day onto them, because they’re counting on us not realising what they’re up to until it’s too late. We mustn’t let them get away with that or to win—FAR too much is at stake.

Alan J. Dixon and the letter

Former US Senator from Illinois, Alan J. Dixon (photo at right), died this week at the age of 86. Dixon was an old-school Illinois politician, part downstate, part Chicago Machine. His focus on getting the most for Illinois probably made him an effective US Senator, but it didn’t make him loved. He was, however, part of my own political activist history.

Like most liberals, I had conflicted feelings about Dixon, whose nickname was “Al the Pal”. When he was US Senator (1981-93), I thought of him as a conservative Democrat, by the standards of the day (though he’d probably be considered moderate now, or, at worst, a Blue Dog). He was from Belleville, near St. Louis, which made him what we called a “Downstate Democrat”, meaning, basically, anyone from outside “Chicagoland” (the greater Chicago metropolitan region, including the city, Cook County outside of Chicago, and most of the counties bordering Cook County). Downstate Democrats were usually more conservative than those from Chicago or the metro region. This wasn’t always a good indicator, of course. Some Chicago Democrats were actually pretty conservative, and US Representative Paul Simon (later a US Senator), who lived in Makanda in southern Illinois, was mostly liberal by the standards of the day.

Dixon had been a fixture of Illinois political life for much of my life in Illinois, but his career began before I was born: In 1951, he became a member of the Illinois House of Representatives in his mid-20s. His career is covered pretty well in the obituary I linked to above, and also in his Wikipedia article, which goes into some of the details of his career that the obituary doesn’t.

By the time he was elected US Senator in the 1980 election, I was moving toward becoming a Democrat, but I wasn’t fully there at that point. So, I have no idea whether I voted for him or the Republican nominee, then-Lieutenant Governor Dave O’Neal (who I’d briefly met when he made a campaign stop in Carbondale during the 1978 campaign to re-elect him and Governor James R. Thompson, who I campaigned for). I can’t be sure who I voted for, because while I wasn’t fully a Democrat in 1980, I also didn't particularly like O’Neil, either, who struck me as cold.

However, I know that I voted for Dixon in 1986 against a Republican who I thought was harshly conservative (as is so often the case with people from that era, by today’s standards she probably would be called a “moderate”).

About a year later, I began lobbying the Illinois delegation in the US Congress on LGBT issues. I was part of a statewide civil rights groups called the Illinois Gay and Lesbian Task Force (IGLTF), which had always been focused on civil rights legislation in the state capital and in Chicago. The group later worked on AIDS-related legislative and policy issues. I started working on Congress because, frankly, no one else was doing it.

I started by working on opposition to the nomination of Robert Bork to the US Supreme Court, which was a successful effort. That work brought me into contact with national LGBT organisations, and I started paying attention to what Congress was up to because of that.

By the summer of 1988, I’d compiled a rather long list of anti-gay votes that Dixon had cast, most of them in support of anti-gay amendments put forward by ragingly anti-gay bigot Jesse Helms, one of only a couple people whose death I’ve celebrated. I got angry and wrote a letter to Dixon, and his office responded by inviting us to a meeting with the Senator in his Washington, DC offices.

That meeting was held on September 14, 1988, and was attend by me, then-IGLTF Co-Chair Joanne Trapani and then-Executive Director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (no relation), Jeffrey Levi. A photo of that meeting is below. It was the first time LGBT activists had met with Dixon directly, and the first time Illinois LGBT activists had met directly with a US Senator from Illinois. That seems so quaint now.

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At the meeting, left to right: Arthur Schenck, then-IGLTF Co-Chair Joanne Trapani, then-Executive Director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (no relation), Jeffrey Levi, US Senator Alan J. Dixon. Photo by Doug Hinkle for Windy City Times, and reprinted with permission in the IGLTF Bulletin newsletter (from which this copy is taken).

I remember Dixon as having a big grin and a firm handshake with what seemed like a mitt. I can’t be sure that was true, though, because I was nervous and much thinner than I am now. He began by saying, “I understand you take some exceptions with some of my votes…” and talked about listening to us. After he spoke for a bit, I said, “Senator, that’s in the past. We’re more interested in talking about things that are coming up.” He visibly brightened at that, knowing we weren’t there to berate him but, rather, to build a dialogue.

Good news from my home state

Today (June 1 in the USA), Illinois’ freedom to marry law took effect. LGBT couples have been able to marry in Cook County (home of Chicago) since February 21, following a federal judge’s ruling, and 1600 couples got licenses since then. Now, couple is all the 102 counties in Illinois will be able to get marriage licenses.

This is a great day for my native Illinois, but when I lived there, this was something I never expected to see in my lifetime. Equality feels pretty awesome. It’s also nice to know that When Nigel and I visit, we’ll still be legally married.

Even so, the work isn’t quite done. The Republican candidate for Governor, Bruce Rauner, last year expressed his opposition to the marriage equality law, Now, activists are pressuring Rauner to publicly state his current position.

The concern is that with all the Republicans at the top of the ticket in Illinois opposed to the freedom to marry, if Rauner was elected he could work behind-the-scenes to block new legislation protecting LGBT families and erode the existing laws.

As I often remind people, all our progress could be wiped away with one bad election, and we’d have to start all over again. Elections have consequences, and voting matters.

But for now, for today, it’s good to just celebrate a good thing happening.

Illinois history

Today was an important day for my native Illinois: Today, Illinois became a free state as Governor Pat Quinn signed the Religious Freedom & Marriage Fairness Act into law.

It was a LONG time getting here, as I well remember. I haven’t blogged much about it*, but I was an LGBT grassroots activist from the early 1980s to the early 1990s with the Illinois Gay and Lesbian Task Force (IGLTF), at the time Illinois’ only statewide LGBT civil rights organisation. It was an interesting time.

In 1986, Chicago attempted to pass an ordinance to protect the civil and human rights of LGBT people. It failed under obstinate opposition from the Roman Catholic Church. That failure led to reorganising that—ultimately—led to the adoption of the city’s Human Rights Ordinance only a couple years later.

However, it was only a few years ago—2005—that Illinois finally passed a state law banning discrimination against LGBT people. That’s something IGLTF had been working toward since the 1970s (well before I came along). Then, the state enacted civil unions in December 2010. They began officially on June 1, 2011.

That’s the stuff anyone could glean from the news media or through a little diligent research. There is, of course, more to it.

On October 14, 1989, IGLTF announced that it would introduce a bill to establish a “domestic partnership registry” which would have allowed opposite-gender and same-gender couples to register their relationship officially. At the time, marriage equality wasn’t seen as even remotely possible.

The motivation behind that was that IGLTF had surveyed its membership to find out what they thought the most important issue was. We assumed it would be civil rights protections, but recognition of gay relationships topped the list, comfortably. There were also practical implications. Tim Drake, who was in charge of state legislation at the time, explained it to me this way: “At the time, there were corporations and unions beginning to push for the rights of gay employees—but, if they wanted to create an employee benefit for a gay spouse, there wasn't a mechanism in place for them to do so. We thought having a statewide registry would give them something to point to, instead of having a dozen different definitions.”

IGLTF gathered together all the domestic partnership legislation of that time and drafted a bill. After the public meeting in October 1989, IGLTF was ready to move forward. Even so, we knew that the bill wouldn’t go anywhere—we wanted to start the debate. As Tim Drake said at the time, “We’re introducing [the bill] now to start the education process, which will be a long process.”

So, we sought out the most “gay friendly” legislator, someone who wouldn’t suffer any political harm. That person was Ellis Levin (no longer a state representative) who represented the most heavily LGBT—and arguably most liberal—district in the state. He balked. In fact, people who were at the meeting with him told me that he "threw a tantrum", claiming we were “ruining” his career. We weren’t buying it; instead we insisted he introduce it, and eventually he did. We were right, of course: Sponsorship wasn’t used against him.

As we’d planned, the bill was never called for a hearing, since it was merely introduced to give us something to organize around. Even so, as Tim put it, “our bill became the impetus for the successful registry in Oak Park.”

That was the earliest ancestry of the bill that was signed into law today. We all knew it would happen some day, but I don’t think any of us could imagine it would be “only” some 24 years later.

Since that time, IGLTF disappeared and many of the activists involved with it retired from activism, some (like me) moved away, and some, sadly, have died. But I think it’s important to remember where we come from and how we got to a place, and this is part of the story.

Finally, a personal note. The new law means that when Nigel and I go to Illinois to visit family and friends, we’ll still be married when we get there. This is an important thing. But there’s something that’s even more important to me: I’m equal.

I’m a native Illinoisan: Born there, grew up there, educated there and lived the first 36 years of my life there. In fact, the only reason I left was that my state and my country didn’t recognise my relationship. They both do now. I don’t know if things would have been different if this had been the law 18 years ago, whether Nigel would have moved to the USA instead, but I do know this: For the first time in my life, I’m equal to all my heterosexual family and friends in Illinois. Whether we ever live there or not, we now—FINALLY—have the same opportunity as everyone else.

The same opportunities as everyone else: Isn’t that part of what equality is all about? That’s what we were fighting for all those years ago, and I have to say, it feels pretty awesome to see it actually happen.

Thank you, Illinois and everyone who made this happen. I knew we’d get there eventually.

* In fact, as near as I can tell, the only time I talked specifically about my time as an activist was when Robert Bork died.

Related: Windy City Times coverage.

Happy Labor Day, USA

It’s Labor Day in the USA today, a holiday many Americans don’t really understand. As Roger Green points out, the day was “NOT invented by Hallmark”. Still, people take it for granted as if it was.

Roger also talked about the history of the federal holiday coming into force in 1894, but one aspect that I always found fascinating is that the date of the USA’s Labour Day was set in September in part to make sure that May 1 didn’t become Labor Day, something that the conservative ruling elites of the day greatly feared after the Haymarket Riots in Chicago in 1886. Conservative Democratic President Grover Cleveland, who signed the Labor Day bill into law, was no friend of labour, and in 1894, he sent the US Army to Illinois to break-up the Pullman Strike over the express objection of the state’s progressive Democratic Governor, John Peter Altgeld (who himself had used the state’s militia during the strike to preserve order).

It would be decades before the US government’s fight against organised labor would start to diminish, only to be resurrected by today’s conservative ruling elites who are, again, trying to destroy unions and workers’ rights. Unions are responsible for the minimum wage, outlawing child labour, the 8-hour day, workplace safety regulations and a whole host of things no sane worker would want to see taken away because all workers benefit from them—which is part of the reason why the conservative ruling elites want to take them away.

The video above is by a UK supporter of unions and workers’ rights, and is several years old. I’ve seen similar backwards/forwards structure in other videos, and it usually works quite well to compare/contrast. What I like about the text in this one is that it explains simply how a unionised workplace can have enormous positive benefits for businesses, despite the claims of empty rightwing propaganda.

Unions have done so much for workers—unionised and not—and we mustn’t forget that. Labor Day ought to be a day when we remember just a little bit of how much better things are for workers now than they were in the 19th Century. You can thank organised labour for that.

New Zealand’s Labour Day, which commemorates the 8-hour workday, is the last Monday in October. This year, NZ Labour Day is Monday, October 28.

One week from today

One week from today, marriage equality takes effect in New Zealand, and this country will take a giant leap forward in achieving equality for all its citizens. As happy as I am for my adopted home, I still want to see the land of my birth, Illinois, adopt marriage equality, too. I’ll be waiting longer than a week for that, but justice and equality are always worth the wait.

Debunking a lie

The radical right religious/political activists have been caught out in another lie, and they’ve been exposed in their continuing attempt to divide LGBT people and Black people.

Tracy Baim, publisher of Windy City Times, videoed this interview with Black Caucus chair Rep. Ken Dunkin after the marriage equality non-vote. He is adamant: This was NOT a Black Caucus issue.

Brian Brown, spokesbigot for the National Organisation for Man/Lady Only Marriage, went WAY out of his way to praise the Black community. This was crass, partisan politics—Bri was trying to put in action NOM’s cynical plan to create division between LGBT people and Black people.

Brian Brown couldn’t possibly care less what Black people think or want, and his organisation is clearly racist, given its deliberate strategy of fomenting division between Black and LGBT people—using Black people, in other words. NO one should buy into the far right’s propaganda attempts to create division where none exists.

There are anti-gay Black legislators, but you know what? There are a helluva lot more anti-gay white legislators—why is their race not an issue? Republicans overwhelmingly oppose the freedom to marry—why is party not an issue? The fact is, radical right religious/political activists have a vested political interest in framing this as a Gay vs. Black issue, when it is absolutely NOT that at all.

Obviously, the modern phrase is, there are lies, damned lies, and the radical right religious/political activists.

Illinois cowards

Rank, vile cowards: That’s what’s in the Illinois House of Representatives. The Illinois Senate passed marriage equality on Valentine’s Day, but the Illinois House is too cowardly to do the same. I have contempt for them.

Apologists will say that there are many members of the House—mostly Democrats, of course, but Republicans, too—who would do the right thing (if they ever get to vote on the bill…). That’s true, there are. Those people should be applauded and supported as heroes of democracy. But what about the rest—especially the rest of the Democrats? Where the hell are they?

Today (May 31 in the USA), the Illinois House of Representatives adjourned its session without voting on the state’s marriage equality bill.

Chief sponsor of the bill, Rep. Greg Harris, speaking though apparently choked up, told the House that some of his colleagues wanted more time to go back to their districts to “consult”. We’re really supposed to believe that the three-and-a-half months since the Senate vote was not “enough” time? It is alleged that Harris acted alone, without ever consulting any members of the coalition—who, in fact, wanted a vote.

Clearly, the obstacles are crass and craven politicians who care only about their paychecks or “power”, political scum who see LGBT people as nothing more than a cash machine; they don’t think they need to do anything more than speak the right words and we’ll all loyally fall in line to give them money and votes because, well, they’re NOT Republicans! The truth is, Republicans hate us and tell us to our face while Democrats say they’re with us, but as soon as we turn our back they plunge the knife in. It’s what Illinois Democrats do, because it’s who they are.

Obviously anti-equality legislators should all be primaried, Democrats included, but apart from those who have publicly declared their opposition to equality, how can we know who our enemies are?

When the legislature reconvenes in autumn, the House will vote on the bill, or it won’t. If it passes, then the state will have marriage equality and all this rage will go away. If it fails, supporters of freedom and equality will know who to target for defeat. But if they still don’t vote, it’s the situation same as right now. This cannot be allowed to happen.

Whatever happens in the autumn “veto session”, there will be politicians to target for defeat, and that must happen. However, that should include at least the most craven of those who refused to commit their support. Illinois voters should never tolerate legislators who persist in being cowards, and neither should political contributors.

My personal view is that those who would ordinarily donate to the Illinois Democratic Party (or any of its sub-units) should tell them that they're putting all donations on hold until the marriage equality bill passes. If it doesn't, apart from Democrats willing to challenge the incumbent cowards, there are plenty of REAL friends who would welcome the contributions so we can punish our faux-friends.

This is important, too, because there will be some supporters of equality who will be targeted by the theocratic extreme right, and those politicians need to be supported. Our side must raise funds for them and help provide support on the campaign trail. Most of those who do the right thing should be rewarded, but they absolutely should be defended against the forces of bigotry and intolerance.

The only people who won today are, in fact, from the theocratic extreme right, who are already gloating about finally winning a victory after a string of major defeats (Hey! Thanks, Illinois Democrats!!). Their lies, threats and bigotry have prevented equality from arriving in Illinois—for now. But good eventually triumphs over evil, and this is no different: The freedom to marry will come to Illinois, not today, obviously, but soon.

The important thing is to begin organising primary challenges in case they’re needed, to withhold all contributions from all Illinois Democratic legislators until/unless they deliver, and to make it clear that delivering the freedom to marry is a prerequisite to receiving any donations in the future.

Our enemies on the theocratic radical right routinely threaten politicians with retribution if they resist the imposition of a radical right theocracy. Our side must be at least as bold. Just as we can no longer tolerate cowards among our “friends” in the Democratic party, neither can we afford to be afraid of walking away and letting Democrats sink. Republicans hate us and tell us; Democrats pretend to be our friends and then betray us. To get our money, they need to prove they’re real Democrats and real friends—words are NOT enough.

No more cowards on our side—anywhere.

It's time, Illinois

It’s time for Illinois to enact the freedom to marry. But time to do so any time soon is running out.

The graphic above is from Illinois Unites for Marriage, a project of ACLU Illinois, Equality Illinois and Lambda Legal. Together, they’re trying to bring the freedom to marry to my native Illinois. I hope they succeed.

They said on their site’s action page:

We only have until Friday, May 31st to pass the freedom to marry. It's time, Illinois.

Passing SB10 in the House is the only hurdle that stands between Illinois becoming the 13th state where same-sex couples can share in the freedom to marry—and we only have a matter of days left to pass this crucial legislation before the General Assembly adjourns on May 31st.

Your Representative needs to hear from you every single day until marriage for same-sex couples becomes law in Illinois! Even if you've messaged them before, they need to hear from you again.

I was born in Illinois, grew up there, was educated there and became an adult there. My parents are buried there. So, I’ll always be an Illinoisan, even though I don’t live there, and regardless of whether or not I ever live there again. However, because I don’t live there, I have no say in what happens. I hope the people who do live in Illinois urge their legislators to do the right thing and vote for the freedom to marry.

It’s time, Illinois.

May Day and me

May Day (also known as International Workers' Day) always seemed sinister when I was a kid. It took me decades to learn it wasn’t.

Growing up during the Cold War, it wasn’t hard to find May Day scary. TV news reports showed a parade through Red Square in Moscow, with the masses marching, waving huge red banners or carrying portraits of Marx, Lenin and whoever the Soviet leaders of the day were. The crowds seemed so fervent, so committed to their ideology. It wasn’t hard to be convinced that all the US propaganda was fact.

But it turned out the origins of May Day were much closer to home.

May Day began as a remembrance of the Haymarket Riots in Chicago, which happened on May 4 1886. During a peaceful rally supporting workers striking for an eight-hour day, an unknown person threw a dynamite bomb at police. That, and the gunfire that erupted afterward, killed seven police officers and at least four of the crowd. Dozens were injured.

A “red scare” followed, with police often brutally cracking down on socialists, anarchists and activists for workers’ rights. The bomber was never identified, but authorities tried and convicted 8 people for conspiracy—in a trial widely regarded as unjust. Four defendants were executed by hanging, the other four were pardoned in 1893 by the progressive Governor of Illinois, John Peter Altgeld (who was defeated in the next election, largely because of his support for labour).

In 1889, a privately funded statue honouring the dead policemen was erected in Haymarket Square. It was damaged several times, and was actually blown up twice by the Weathermen (in 1969 and 1970). Each time the statue was damaged, it was restored. In 1972, it was moved to the Chicago Police Headquarters (later to its training academy), but the pedestal remained empty for decades. In 1992, bronze plaque was placed on the spot where the wagon from which speakers addressed the crowd had stood. In 2004, a memorial sculpture—depicting a 15-foot speaker’s wagon—was unveiled.

Growing up, and believing the anti-socialist propaganda of the local, state and federal governments of the day, I had no reason to learn the real story of the Haymarket Riots, so I didn’t know it was the reason behind the selection of May Day as a day for workers. For that matter, I didn’t know the truth about social democratic countries.

Now, of course, I live in a social democracy, with its mix of market socialism, welfare state progressivism and market-focused capitalism. I’ve seen firsthand that social democratic programmes condemned in the USA, such as national healthcare, are actually good things that benefit society, and that such things are not evil, as I’d been taught to believe.

Still, on May Day in New Zealand we don’t break into a rousing rendition of “The Internationale”. I bet most Kiwis, like their American cousins, probably don’t even know what that is. Our Labour Day holiday—celebrating the 8-hour workday—is at the end of October.

The video at the top of this post is of Arturo Toscanini conducting a version of “The Internationale” in 1944. It’s part of a film featurette to honour the Allied victory in Italy in World War 2 in which Toscanini conducted Verdi’s “Hymn of the Nations”, adding “The Star-Spangled Banner” for the USA and “The Internationale” for the Soviet Union (until that year, “The Internationale” was the national anthem of the Soviet Union). In the “red scares” of the 1950s, US censors had other ideas about all this and deleted “The Internationale” from the film. The complete, uncensored version is on YouTube, of course (and, oddly enough, “The Star-Spangled Banner” follows “The Internationale”). The music was performed by the NBC Symphony Orchestra, with the Westminister Choir and the tenor Jan Peerce as soloist.

It turns out that the world is much more interesting than American propaganda led me to believe. History is almost never a simplistic binary story in which one side is all good and the other is all bad. Humans, and our stories, are far too complicated for that. So, the struggle for workers’ rights or the attempts to stop them, the Haymarket Riots and the origins of May Day, or even socialism itself—none of these are simplistic morality tales. They’re far more interesting.

Some Illinois pride

Tomorrow, National Journal will publish rankings of the most liberal and most conservative members of the US Congress, according to members’ votes. Today, they released teasers that are interesting in themselves.

Among the US Senate's top 16 most liberal members, Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois was rated as tied for third. This is ironic, considering how many in the US' political left don't like him because of his record on certain issues (a topic in itself, but his incorrect stance on Internet freedom is one of them). Still, he’s right on many issues, and politics is not a game that purists win.

Illinois’ other US Senator, Republican Mark Kirk, was not on the list of the top 16 most conservative US Senators. That’s good. The top 16 are all Republicans, of course. Also, I doubt many Americans have ever heard of the most conservative Senator (I hadn’t).

Among the top 26 most liberal House Members are three from Illinois, including two (Danny Davis and Bobby Rush) in a 14-way tie for most liberal. My own US Representative, Jan Schakowsky, was tied for 24th. Not too bad.

There were NO Illinois US Representatives among the top 26 most conservative US House Members—great news! Todd "Legitimate Rape" Akin was the most conservative. There were no Democrats on that list, either, of course.

The full lists will be interesting, but I’m glad to see that my home state is so well represented among liberals—although I’d like to see more on the lists, of course. It also doesn’t surprise me that we don’t have any seriously rightwing conservatives—Illinois just isn’t that kind of state (in 2012, Illinois voters kicked out their “Teapublican” US Representatives, replacing them with Democrats). Illinois has long been a mostly moderate state that sometimes goes a bit right of centre, and sometimes a bit to the left.

All of which are more reasons I’m proud to be from that state.

Illinois Senate Democrats advocating marriage equality

From the YouTube video description:

“Several members of the Illinois Senate Democratic caucus talk about same-sex marriage during the Feb. 14 debate of Senate Bill 10, the Religious Freedom and Marriage Fairness Act.”

There are some heartfelt pleas in these speeches. Among my favourite lines were two from Sen. Toi Hutchinson who said, speaking specifically to GLBT parents and their children, “Please know that there are people of faith who see you and hear you.” She then added, quoting Dr. Martin Luther King, “Please know that we understand that a threat to justice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” Clearly, she gets it.

The final vote for passage was 34-21. The bill now moves to the Illinois House of Representatives.

Illinois Wins, Part One

Today, Valentine’s Day in the USA, the Illinois State Senate voted to enact marriage equality. I’m a native of Illinois, so I’m especially proud of my native US state for doing the right thing. Now, it’s on to the Illinois House and, after it approves marriage equality, the Governor’s signature. This is a good day, with more to come.

Well done, Illinois!!