What a week for the Bilerico sites this has been! First we were named one of the Advocate's "Top Political Blogs" and then we celebrated our second birthday with news of an upcoming redesign. Let us know what you like and don't like about the site so we can incorporate your suggestions! While you're waiting for new posts to start again after the holiday, here's the best posts from this week. Enjoy the holiday weekend!

Bilerico Nation

Transformers 2: "Homophobia in Disguise" Filed by: Zac Hart (Bilerico-Indiana)
My Pride Party & the White Elephant Filed by: Keri Renault (Bilerico-DC)
Oakland Park Passes Repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" City Resolution Filed by: Anthony Niedwiecki (Bilerico-Florida)

Friday

Freedom Filed by: John Shields
The Relentless Damage of Pope Benedict XVI Filed by: Father Tony

Thursday

Another Historic Meeting, Another Melanin-free Transgender Contingent Filed by: Monica Roberts
Dump Gay Marriage Now Filed by: Yasmin Nair

Wednesday

Terrorists in Blue: Police Running Out of Control Filed by: Patricia Nell Warren
Uncovering Feminism: Emma Bee Bernstein and a few questions about suicide Filed by: Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore

Tuesday

Prop 8: A Spoonful of Sugar Filed by: Dana Rudolph
Welcome to Your White House Filed by: Cathy Renna

Monday

Fort Worth Gay Bar Raid: Stonewall Redux Filed by: Waymon Hudson
Clubland's Wonder Woman: Kristine W interview Filed by: Guest Blogger Scott David

Sunday

Rockstar Energy Drink fracas update Filed by: Bil Browning
Outside the binary Filed by: Alex Blaze

WFLA Homophobic TV Program: Help Decide the Next Steps
Click here to take our survey.

Protest at the studio? Reach out to advertisers? Boycott?

Over the past few days we've gotten tons of email from across Florida suggesting next steps as our community responds to the airing of the reckless, homophobic program on WFLA (NBC) in Tampa.

This has become a statewide and nationwide issue as anti-gay extremists shop this hateful infomercial around. Many have rejected the program as blatantly and dangerously bigoted. Others, including Tampa's NBC affiliate have cashed the $35,000
check without a concern for the harm inflicted on the gay community.

Thousands of our supporters have contacted the station to condemn the airing of the program "Silencing the Christians".

Continue reading "Shame on NBC! Homophobic Programming During Pride Month" »

It's not enough that he has set Catholicism back several decades (you should have known that was his objective when he chose the name of the last pope he could actually respect, Benedict XV, 1914-1922, who invented canon law). Having torched seminaries with his witch hunt for homosexual candidates for the priesthood, he has now turned his bloody eye on that weakest and most endangered workforce of the Roman Catholic Church, the nuns.

As reported in The New York Times, B16 has initiated what he is calling a "visitation", but let's call it what it really is, an inquisition. He's gotten wind of the fact that some nuns don't wear habits, some nuns have secular work (gotta pay the bills on those vast and empty convents) and some nuns have supposedly developed an interest in Reiki. B16 in usual Vatican fashion lumps Reiki in with voodoo and sees it as opposed to Catholic faith. (This is a subject for another day, but Reiki actually talks about the flow of healing energy from and within the human body. Substitute grace for energy and you're on safe Catholic ground. Plus, the "laying on of hands" is part of ancient Catholic tradition and ritual. Reiki just does it more intently.)

Because B16 can't ride his dark horse up to the gate of each and every American convent, he has deputized an American nun as his grand inquisitor visitator. The New York Times calls her "apple-cheeked" and with "smiling eyes," but make no mistake. She is B16 in a dress. Oh wait. A different dress (supply any reverse drag joke you like). Mother Mary Clare Millea has a degree in canon law from the Lateran University in Rome. She's a well-connected Vatican tool. Beneath her sweet words of overture to the nuns of America is the obvious disciplinary intent.

Continue reading "The Relentless Damage of Pope Benedict XVI" »

Over the next 100 days, Stonewall Library & Archives needs 100 supporters who will contribute 100 dollars.

100Days x 100People x 100Dollars

Everyone who contributes 100 dollars during this drive receives a Stonewall baseball cap!

100Days x 100People x 100Dollars

Go online today and make a donation or see Jack or Chad at the library and help us reach our summer goal of $10,000.

www.stonewall-library.org

At the July 1st commission meeting, the Oakland Park City Commission, working with the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN), American Veterans for Equal Rights (AVER), Fight OUT Loud, and many other organizations, brought forward a city resolution calling for the President and the United States Congress to adopt the Military Readiness Enhancement Act of 2009 (House Resolution 1283), which eliminates the 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' (DADT) policy, which bans brave and dedicated Gay and Lesbian Servicemembers from serving openly in the Military.

The resolution passed unanimously.

SLDN has been working on a nation-wide effort to get local governments to pass resolutions requesting adoption of this Federal legislation to show the overwhelming support for lifting the discriminatory ban. Brian Fricke and Matt Sampson, with SLDN and AVER, have been working with various local officials, including me and Vice Mayor Flippen of Wilton Manors, to pass these resolutions.

Oakland Park becomes only the second city in Florida and the eleventh in the Country to pass such a resolution.

Continue reading "Oakland Park Passes Repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" City Resolution" »

On Tuesday, a military board told Lt. Dan Choi, an Iraq War veteran and Arabic linguist, that it was recommending his discharge from the Army for "moral and professional dereliction" under the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy. He would be stripped of his rank.

Despite this setback, Lt. Choi is not giving up. Bolstered by more than 300,000 signatures to letters of support calling for the repeal of DADT, Dan is now taking his fight to repeal the discriminatory "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy to Congress.

Dan needs your help as soon as possible.

I just signed the letter in the link below to Speaker Nancy Pelosi that Lt. Choi is going to personally deliver to her. The letter is being launched on Lt. Choi's behalf by the Courage Campaign, Knights Out and the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network.

We need Speaker Pelosi to take leadership now and speak out publicly in favor of current legislation in Congress that would repeal the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy.

More than 50,000 people, including me, have signed Lt. Choi's letter in just a few hours. Will you join me in signing it and urge your friends to do the same? Just click on the link below to add your name:

http://www.couragecampaign.org/RepealDADT

Thanks!

Chuck

When I was asked to review The Progressive Revolution: How the Best in America Came to Be by Michael Lux of Openleft.com fame, I expected another partisan rehash of "Yay Liberals! Boo Conservatives!" with little depth. Instead, what I got was one of the most insightful and exciting historical looks at America's ongoing battle with itself and its ideals I have ever read.

The book takes an illuminating walk through American history, from our founding to modern day, highlighting "Big Change Moments" that have altered the course of our country, for good or bad. Filled with quotes, facts, and long-lost historical tidbits, the book could come off as dry, but Lux's voice and humor bring the reader along and make it nearly impossible to put down.

To be completely honest- this is the first book since college that I have found myself taking notes on and highlighting passages in, just because it was filled with so much amazing information.

This book is much more, however, than just an interesting read. It is a timely cautionary tale on what has become the troubling buzzwords of the current administration: "compromise" and "bipartisan."

Continue reading "Book Review: The Progressive Revolution" »

Dear Father Tony

My steady boyfriend is a man who can't dance. He won't even try to learn how to dance. I dragged him onto the floor at our club just once. His face was so sad I gave up after a minute. My mother always said (not to me specifically) "Watch out for the ones who don't dance." I love to dance but I'm falling for a man I'll never dance with. Should I run the other way?

Fred no Ginger

Continue reading "Should You Love a Wallflower?" »

At New York City's Gay and Lesbian Community Center, on Thursday June 25, 2009, the surviving founding members of the Gay Liberation Front (GLF) each had 3 minutes to tell a personal story from the earliest days of the movement. They discuss organizing, Stonewall, picketing, civil rights, dating, romance, activism and police action. Absolutely fascinating first hand accounts. This is the fifth of a series of five raw and unedited clips from the speeches of some of these great gay heroes.

(Video by Father Tony)

If you can't trust a doctor....

This is in the Miami Herald:

A Miami physician was sentenced Monday to eight years in prison after admitting he fraudulently prescribed HIV therapy for Medicare patients who didn't need or get the treatment, costing the government program millions of dollars.

Dr. Roberto Rodriguez, 54, was ordered by U.S. District Judge Paul Huck to pay more than $9 million in restitution to Medicare. Rodriguez was co-owner of Midway Medical Center and director of other local HIV infusion clinics, where he and five convicted co-conspirators recruited patients, paid kickbacks and manipulated records to bilk Medicare, records show.

Rodriguez admitted his clinics submitted more than $20 million in false claims to Medicare from October 2003 to February 2005.

Another physician in the racket, Dr. Carmen del Cueto, is scheduled to be sentenced in September.

Any readers want to offer a word of praise for good Florida HIV docs, either by personal experience of through word of mouth? This ought to be on a "Best of" annual list.

At New York City's Gay and Lesbian Community Center, on Thursday June 25, 2009, the surviving founding members of the Gay Liberation Front (GLF) each had 3 minutes to tell a personal story from the earliest days of the movement. They discuss organizing, Stonewall, picketing, civil rights, dating, romance, activism and police action. Absolutely fascinating first hand accounts. This is the fourth of a series of five raw and unedited clips from the speeches of some of these great gay heroes.

(Video by Father Tony)

At New York City's Gay and Lesbian Community Center, on Thursday June 25, 2009, the surviving founding members of the Gay Liberation Front (GLF) each had 3 minutes to tell a personal story from the earliest days of the movement. They discuss organizing, Stonewall, picketing, civil rights, dating, romance, activism and police action. Absolutely fascinating first hand accounts. This is the third of a series of five raw and unedited clips from the speeches of some of these great gay heroes.

(Video by Father Tony)