President Barack Obama endorsed the right of same-sex couples to marry on Wednesday, a landmark pronouncement made in light of mounting pressure from gay rights advocates.
Obama became the first U.S. president to back the right of gay and lesbian couples to marry, a reversal from views expressed during the 2008 campaign, when he said he opposed same-sex marriage but favored civil unions as an alternative.
Obama told ABC News that, after reflection, he had “concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married.”
chumble spuzz
Posts tagged politics
May9
Jan23
Senate has votes needed to pass gay marriage legislation | Seattle Times Newspaper→
Like.
Sen. Mary Margaret Haugen, D-Camano Island, said she supports gay marriage legislation in the Senate — giving proponents the 25 votes needed for passage.
The state House already has enough lawmakers in support of the measure to approve it. Gov. Chris Gregoire backs the bill, as well.
Haugen issued announced her support immediately after a two-hour legislative hearing in Olympia about the bill.
(via Seattle Times)
Sep20
Nice to see the President of the United States highlight these steps as an accomplishment. Click here for a link to the full PDF version of the graphic.
Progress for the LGBT community
From hosting the first White House LGBT pride reception in 2009 to declaring the Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional this February, here’s a timeline of steps President Obama has taken for LGBT equality since taking office.
(via BarackObama.com)
Mar16
BLTWY and its readers come through again. It might be worthwhile think about not making a “LOL” vote button standard on every story with the next redesign.
(screenshot and highlighting via Chris Cast)
Dec15
House passes repeal of 'don't ask, don't tell'→
The House voted Wednesday to repeal the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that for 17 years has forced gays desiring to serve in the military to conceal their sexual identity.
The 250-175 vote propels the issue to the Senate for what could be the last chance for now to end the 1993 law that forbids recruiters from asking about sexual orientation while prohibiting soldiers from acknowledging that they are gay.
(via msnbc.com)
Nov10
New York Times deputy graphics editor Matthew Ericson searches for the earliest election map produced by the paper. Also included in his post are a couple of examples of how the map changed in following years.
Or at least the first one published on the day after the election? A year or two ago, I went digging thru the archives to see if I could find the first election results map published in an edition of the Times dated the day after the election. This is the earliest one I found, which was published in the Wednesday, November 4, 1896 edition of the paper and headlined “A map showing how all the states in the union have cast their electoral votes, those which have gone for M’Kinley being in white and those for Bryan in black.”
Oct28
Candidate supports troops, but flier shows Germans
A North Carolina legislator has apologized after a campaign flier that was meant to cast him as military-friendly featured a photo portraying advancing German World War II soldiers.
The direct-mail political consulting firm that produced the promotional piece designed to boost N.C. Rep. Tim Spear, D-Washington, said it was solely responsible for the mistake. He is running against Republican Bob Steinberg.
The flier destined for about 10,000 homes in Spear’s district was headlined: “In North Carolina, One Legislator is Covering Our Soldiers’ Backs.” It described Spear’s support for military-friendly legislation, including bills that made it harder to foreclose the homes of active-duty service members.
The art department at Washington, D.C.-based MSHC Partners found a photo that visually captured the Spear’s message, but no one noticed that it showed the backs of four advancing World War II re-enactors dressed in German army uniforms, senior account executive Mike Brown said Wednesday.
(via The Rocky Mount Telegram)
Oct14
Whitney is 'Whitey' on some ballots :: CHICAGO SUN-TIMES :: Election 2010→
A misspelling leads to candidate’s name appearing as “Rich Whitey” on touch-screen voting machines in certain ares of Chicago.
The last name of Green Party gubernatorial candidate Rich Whitney is misspelled as “Whitey” on electronic-voting machines in nearly two dozen wards — about half in predominantly African-American areas — and election officials said Wednesday the problem cannot be corrected by Election Day…
…”I don’t want to be identified as ‘Whitey.’ If this is happening in primarily African-American wards, that’s an even bigger concern,” Whitney told the Chicago Sun-Times. “I don’t know if this is machine politics at play or why this happened.”
Oct5
Bolivian president knees soccer opponent
President Evo Morales kneed an opposing player in the groin during a soccer match against a team of political rivals after an apparent hard foul by the opponent, images of the altercation broadcast Monday show.
(via World news - Americas - msnbc.com)
(Source: youtube.com)
Sep27
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