Anchorage gets a homophobic mayor, New England gets gay marriage

It's a good news, bad news week at Bent Alaska, and it's only Wednesday. The bad news is that Anchorage elected Sullivan to a three year term as mayor. 

As a member of the Assembly, Dan
1. tried to block domestic partner benefits in Anchorage after the state Supreme Court granted them, 
2. led the opposition against selling a municipal building to Out North, and 
3. tried to block a PFLAG-sponsored display in the high schools.

On the Assembly, he was unsuccessful in these efforts against us. We hope that he will continue to be unsuccessful in pushing a far right social agenda in his role as mayor.

The good news
Gays and lesbians disappointed by the local news can take comfort in the great national progress on equal rights: Gay marriage is legal in Maine today, and might be legal in New Hampshire by next week.

The legislature of Maine passed a same sex marriage bill yesterday and Gov. Baldacci signed it today, the first time a governor signed a marriage equality bill without a court ruling.

The New Hampshire legislature also passed a marriage bill today. Gov. Lynch has five days to sign, veto, or ignore the bill. Will NH be the 6th state to legalize our marriages? (The current 5 are Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, Vermont and Maine.) 

The D.C. city council voted 12-1 to recognize same sex marriages, and Mayor Fenty is likely to sign the measure. 

Marriage bills are also progressing in New York and New Jersey. New York already recognizes out-of-state same sex marriages.

On a light note, Mormon entertainer Marie Osmond told a radio talk show host that she loves her lesbian daughter and supports gay equality.

6 comments:

RunninL8 said...

Hooray for the "good news"!!!

Ek. But the non-lips, hair and homophobary to come.....

Philip Munger said...

ER,

I'm going to cross-post this at Progressive Alaska. Good contrast. Unfortunately, Anchorage is on the wrong end of the contrast.

Melissa S. Green said...

And yet I wonder -- Alaska (along with Hawaii) was at the forefront of the same-sex marriage battle in the mid to late 1990s (Jay Brause & Gene Dugan's lawsuit). That led to the rightwingnut reaction that resulted in our 1998 "one man one woman" state constitutional amendment, & Hawaii got something similar in that same election. But -- would the progress in New England & Iowa have come about without those original efforts in the youngest two states?

Just thinking aloud here.

Anonymous said...

It is easy for us to jump to assumptions of whether he will be a homophobic mayor. He isn't even mayor yet. Give the man a chance to prove himself before you jump to the extreme conclusion.

Our new leader Barack is against gay marriage, so do we have a homophobic president?

Just wondering.

And for those of you lamenting the lack of "progress" because we don't have a left leaning mayor, I personally believe we will have better public policy by forcing both factions to the table.

Melissa S. Green said...

We don't have to "jump to assumptions" about his homophobia. We already have evidence of his homopobia.

E. Ross said...

Dan has already proven himself on the Assembly, where he opposed everything that related to gay people. My conclusion is based on his record.

Obama opposes gay marriage, but supports a wide variety of other gay rights issues. So no, I wouldn't consider him homophobic.

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