Postscript: The heroine of French marriage equality

In what can only be a sign of her increased power as a French political figure, Christiane Taubira, the Cabinet Minister who pushed through marriage equality, is the subject target of some sparkling satire.

Google and you will discover that she is People Magazine's 'Sexiest Politician Alive'.

For the second year in a row, our gorgeous hottie beat out some other equally hot women for the number one spot! And we can't say we disagree!

Twitter Frenzy

Within minutes of Christiane Taubira being announced as this year’s winner, it had become the top trending topic on Twitter:

Sexiest Politician Alive

“She is unquestionably beautiful, she’s been smartly building her career on more than her looks,” wrote one fan.

“#Christiane Taubira being named THE Sexiest Woman Alive makes her boyfriend the luckiest Man Alive?” joked another one.

Not only that but she is the 'Highest-Paid Politician in the World'!

The French politician has an estimated net worth of $185 million. She owes her fortune to smart stock investments, substantial property holdings, lucrative endorsement deals with CoverGirl cosmetics. She also owns several restaurants (the “Fat Taubira Burger” chain) in Paris, a Football Team (the “Cayenne Angels”), has launched her own brand of Vodka (Pure Wondertaubira - France), and is tackling the juniors market with a top-selling perfume (With Love from Christiane) and a fashion line called “Christiane Taubira Seduction”.

The ranking is significant for many Taubira fans, who have been waiting for her triumphant return to the glory days for what seems like a lifetime.

Then there is her adorable dog 'Spinee' (who also appears to be owned by Bill Gates and a former Chelsea player, according to the Guardian) and is 'Recovering from Surgery'.

Throughout the night the French politician posted updates to her numerous followers, about her dog’s delicate condition. “Spinee came out of the anesthetic well … her vital signs are good … your prayers are working,” she Tweeted.

Christiane Taubira continued tweeting about her pup’s prognosis throughout the night and it appears the pooch is on the mend. By Wednesday morning, things continued to look good. “The Spinee Report: Her vital signs are good… pink gums … sleeping peacefully… recovering as hoped,” she said. “Not out of the woods yet. Prayers working :)”

Er, maybe not. It's these guys -- Mediamass:

The project's name is an ironic reversal of portmanteau “mass-media” (media for the masses) in “media-mass” which here means “media en masse” as mass production and therefore mass consumption are the object of our criticism.

The website mediamass.net is the medium of our satire to expose with humour, exaggeration and ridicule the contemporary mass production and mass consumption that we observe

Also it will not only mock the procuders (mainstream media, journalists) as it is common when questioning and criticizing mass media, but also the consumers as one cannot exist without the other. Sensationalism, lack of verification of information, ethics and standards issues are only symptoms of the actual social and economic order. This is particularly obvious when observing the role of social networking sites in spreading rumours.

We won’t change the world, but at least we'll laugh trying.

Ha! Cet homme a la satire, il emporte la pièce.

The heroine of French marriage equality

French lesbians and gays have a new heroine and her name is Christiane Taubira.

The French Minister for Justice is widely regarded as the person most responsible for pushing marriage equality through its fiery passage through the French parliament.

Her work has won her wider accolades too but it wasn't always thus, once she was regarded as a joke, if not a traitor to the left.

Taubira is that rarest of things, a black French politician. She has represented French Guiana, part of South America best known as the location for Europe's space launches and actually a department, part of metropolitan France, since 1993.

From a poor family and from the left she stood as a Presidential candidate for the Radical Party in 2003 to ensuing boos when the Socialist Party candidate came third, behind the National Front's Jean-Marie Le Pen. Her tiny vote was looked at as creating a national French embarrassment. Left wing allies have also called her a bully and authoritarian.

Made a Minister by Francois Hollande she has come back into favour, pushing forward a law last year that categorises the slave trade and slavery as crimes against humanity.

But it is her full-throated and eloquent push for marriage equality in the face of not just fierce, sometimes violent, opposition but also as well as tepid support of her own President and party, that has turned her into a modern day Marianne, the symbol of 'Liberté, égalité, fraternité'.

Her January 29 parliamentary speech, delivered without notes, was described as "fiery and lyrical". She laid into the right wing, who have used their opposition to marriage equality, a cynical coalition between the conservatives and the far-right National Front, as a way to bash the unpopular socialist President. She said:

What are gay couples’ marriages going to do to heterosexual couples’ marriages? Nothing. We are talking about the hypocrisy of those who to refuse to recognise homosexual families and the selfishness of those who believe that an institution of the Republic should be reserved for one type of citizen.

Your children and grandchildren already recognise these couples and families, and will do so more and more. You will be very uncomfortable when, out of curiosity, they read the transcripts of these debates.

In that speech she cited Guyanese writer Léon-Gontran Damas:

The act we will accomplish [in passing this law] is ‘as beautiful as a rose that the Eiffel Tower, at last, can see blooming.’ It is ‘as great as our need for fresh air.’ It is ‘as strong as a piercing cry in a long, long night’.

Throughout she has quoted literary heroes. In her final speech yesterday it was Nietzsche: Les vérités tuent, celles que l'on tait deviennent vénéneuses / Truth kills. And if you repress it, it will kill you.

Even her chief opponent, the conservative MP Jean-Frédéric Poisson, told Libération that he had "respect for [Taubira] as a fighter … and for her talent." Many ordinary French people have been won over by her ‘fou rire’ (crazy laugh), heard when she broke into uncontrollable laughter following yet another anti-gay statement in parliament by a right-wing MP during the often interminable and all-night manoeuvrings to delay passage of the law.

She is being compared to two previous symbols of the fight for social justice in France: Simone Veil, who, as minister of health, fought to legalise abortion in 1975, and Robert Badinter, a former justice minister who led the effort to abolish the death penalty in 1981.

In the absence of celebrity endorsement for marriage equality, a French curiosity compared to the US, Taubira has become the star for France's LGBT community.

Yannick Barbe, of news site Yagg, told France24:

You could call it Taubiramania. We were missing a charismatic figure in our fight for equal rights. Now we have one.

Yagg have been selling #TeamTaubira T-shirts.

There are a couple of constitutional hurdles but according to a promise from the Minister Najat Vallaud-Belkacem, socialist mayor of the southern city of Montpellier, Hélène Mandroux, should officiate the first gay marriage "probably in late June or early July."

Watch video and read English translation of Taubira’s Speech to the National Assembly after the passage of the bill opening marriage and adoption to same-sex couples after the jump:

'Fairweather friends' and palpitating queer/ns

Today, Hillary Clinton announced her support for marriage equality in a video (see it after the jump). On any LGBT website below the line, in the comments, you will read - presumably - L,G,B or T people condemning her.

It is too late, why didn't she do it before, she's no real ally - you can guess the script.

When the first serving Republican Senator came out for marriage equality last week similar things were said. Same with the conservative British Prime Minister. And the sharpened poison aimed at President Obama by gays on his supposed inauthentic support for gay rights is everywhere.

In her video, Clinton notes her work on LGBT rights whilst she was Secretary of State. In particular, Clinton gave a powerful speech, introducing new policy, in Geneva in 2011 defending LGBT human rights, which she talks about today.

Following her speech, I published an explanation by Doug Sanders of how Clinton's new policy and outspokenness was actually a 'catch up' on the work of numerous other countries well before the US finally got to work. Yet that critique of Clinton is noticeably absent from any of today's criticism of her. The insularity of American gays who are today criticising her, and actually of those citing her State Department work in her defense as well, is telling.

What distinguishes Obama from Clinton is that he has been explicit on numerous occasions in acknowledging that, horror, he is a politician and that it is pressure from below, from movements, which moves him towards, say, openly supporting marriage equality. I've written about this numerous times, particularly in the context of the 2008 fight for the Democratic Party nomination where his statements on this subject contrasted sharply with Clinton's.

During the campaign he gave one interview to an LGBT publication in which he said the following:

Anybody who’s been at an LGBT event with me can testify that my message is very explicit -- I don’t think that the gay and lesbian community, the LGBT community, should take its cues from me or some political leader in terms of what they think is right for them. It’s not my place to tell the LGBT community, "Wait your turn." I’m very mindful of Dr. King’s “Letter From Birmingham Jail,” where he says to the white clergy, "Don’t tell me to wait for my freedom."

A year after Obama's election he addressed the Human Rights Campaign and here is what I posted at the time:

Here's my tweets as I listened to his speech.

pauloCanning: #hrc dinner "I love you Barack" "I love you back"
pauloCanning:#hrc dinner Obama: "It is a privilege to be here tonight to open for Lady GaGa"
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner He's referencing Stonewall as 'inspiring'
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner simple message "here with you in that fight"
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner 'it's not for me to tell you to be patient' - as with civil rights - now I'm teary
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner 'you know - and I know - we don't want to be defined by one part of us that makes us whole'
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner 'Do not doubt the direction we're heading +the destination we will reach'
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner 'we will put a stop to discrimination against gays and lesbians'
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner 'we're pushing for a employee non-discrimination bill. we're ging to put a stop to it.'
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner 'we are rescinding the ban on entering US based on HIV status'
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner 'I will end DADT, that's my commitment to you'
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner 'I've called on Congress to repeal DOMA'
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner 'It's about our common humanity, our ability to walk in someone else's shoes'
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner now he's talking about PFLAG 'that's the story of America'
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner 'tonight somewhere in America a young person ... ' THAT'S leadership
pauloCanning: #hrc dinner brilliant rhetoric, worried by the look on his face

The speech was amazing. Historic.

Like the audience, who spent most of their time on their feet, I was really moved to hear a US President say what he said. His last flourish, which stuck progress of LGBT equality firmly into the mainstream of the 'American dream', I couldn't capture quickly enough. It was his classic rhetorical end flourish and he stuck it firmly onto the LGBT cause.

My friend Tobias Grace, who edits New Jersey's LGBT newspaper, said: "Paul: I cried - not so much on my own behalf but thinking of all the young people who will grow up in a world shaped by this man's words and leadership."

But, but ... perhaps that's why I noticed the look. He wasn't smiling. He knew that outside the cheering crowd he faced weren't just pissed LGBT at the lack of actual progress on issue after issue but a mountain of opposition to everything he'd pledged.

Remember, this was the day on which he'd been awarded the Nobel. On what he represents he'd got that acknowledgment and that's a f*cking heavy burden.

I wish I'd captured that exact look as he walked off the stage because it seemed to me one of a man who believed what he'd said, every word, but understood fully what 'change' actually means.

A bitter, bitter fight lies behind "don’t tell me to wait for my freedom". As always, it's accompanied by the background/backroom faint (to some) buzz accompanying it in the LGBT movement between those who would be inside and those who'd be outside, demanding.

Tomorrow's LGBT march on the Capitol is for the demanders and something tells me Obama is with them.

Watch Clinton's video released today after the jump:

Another Prop 8 postscript

On his blog, the Guardian's Michael Tomasky asks 'Does Barack Obama believe in gay marriage?'

I know he's officially against it. But I'm asking you -- as a matter of personal belief, like if he were just a highly successful lawyer in Chicago rather than the president of the Yew-nited States -- do you think he'd be for, or on some personal level he won't discuss currently is in fact, a gay marriage supporter?

Here's what I think.

There are some rumours that he'll make a major statement around the Stonewall 40th anniversary. There's a real head of steam grassroots movement getting going and it's only going to get angrier - including with those telling them to be quiet and patient such as the Washington gay lobbyist types who many blame for the Prop 8 loss. He will throw out a bone.

I doubt there's not quiet pressure as well as the Democrats have high profile gay supporters - think what happened when entertainment mogul and major fundraiser David Geffen was snubbed by Bill Clinton and early and very publicly supported Obama - but it would be on gays-in-the-military, Don't Ask, Don't Tell (DADT), not gay marriage.

As Nate Silver points out, the latter will steadily make its way across the country (see this post on the metrics of that). The former has overwhelming support in the country with only some of the military bureaucrats and top brass are, I think, seriously able to delay it for that much longer through keeping Obama's ear, as appears to be the case at the moment.

A more serious issue is the Defence of Marriage Act (DOMA, a Bill Clinton legacy), as I'd bet repeal might not even get through the Senate at the moment - remember, Hillary fudged it during the campaign and it's the bluedogs (right leaning democrats) who have the balance of power - and in reality a lot of practical change flows from getting rid of that.

On where his true belief is, who knows. But I do believe that when he first stood for election in Illinois he said he supported gay marriage, so the change of stance tells you a lot. It's all politics.

Why gay marriage will (eventually) pass in all US states (even Mississippi)

The decision of California's Supreme Court to reject the challenge to the ban on gay marriage – Proposition 8 – voted on by the people in November 2008, seems to have excited much 'woe is us' comment (as well as rallies in 104 American cities and towns last night).

Alistair Campbell even blogged that:

It left millions across the state and across America in despair wondering when they will get the opportunity to be treated equally in the eyes of the law and of society.

Yesterday’s decision cancelled out much of what San Francisco gay rights campaigner Harvey Milk, the subject of a brilliant recent film – and many others – worked for. It may be years until gay Californians again have the rights already enjoyed by the people of Iowa, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts and Vermont.

Actually, I suspect Milk would have had more of a sense of proportion and definitely more of a sense of history.

Prop 8 - gay marriage remember, not civil partnerships (that weird 'seperate-but-equal' status which gave Tony Blair a nice liberal shiver) - came within a couple of points of being defeated.

Already activists have vowed to try again ASAP. And they'll get what they want - something Milk probably didn't even dream of - real equality.

It's inevitable because the culture is only going in one direction - pro-equality.

The stats whiz Nate Silver, THE 'go-to' guy when it comes to reading poll results (and other predictive factors), who best predicted the 2008 Presidential race (and who I referenced a lot in my posts about that) says so.

Following the passage of gay marriage in Iowa he built a predictive model whose outcome is that gay marriage will come in every US state by 2024, with half getting there by 2012. He discovered that you can build it on only three variables.

1. The year in which the amendment was voted upon;
2. The percentage of adults in 2008 Gallup tracking surveys who said that religion was an important part of their daily lives;
3. The percentage of white evangelicals in the state.

Its accuracy is such that:

The model predicts, for example, that a marriage ban in California in 2008 would have passed with 52.1 percent of the vote, almost exactly the fraction actually received by Proposition 8.

Because of changes in US society:

Marriage bans are losing ground at a rate of slightly less than 2 points per year.

Below are the dates when the model predicts that each of the 50 states would vote against a marriage ban. Asterisks indicate states which had previously passed amendments to ban gay marriage.

2009 (now)
Vermont
New Hampshire
Massachusetts
Maine
Rhode Island
Connecticut
Nevada*
Washington
Alaska*
New York
Oregon*

2010
California*
Hawaii
Montana*
New Jersey
Colorado*

2011
Wyoming
Delaware
Idaho*
Arizona*

2012
Wisconsin*
Pennsylvania
Maryland
Illinois

2013
Michigan*
Minnesota
Iowa
Ohio*
Utah*
Florida*

2014
New Mexico
North Dakota*
Nebraska*
South Dakota*

2015
Indiana
Virginia*
West Virginia
Kansas*

2016
Missouri*

2018
Texas*

2019
North Carolina
Louisiana*
Georgia*

2020
Kentucky*

2021
South Carolina*
Oklahoma*

2022
Tennessee*
Arkansas*

2023
Alabama*

2024
Mississippi*

So don't worry, be happy! :]

Postscript: The ruling, as with the original vote, has stirred up a massive grass-roots movement for LGBT civil rights in the United States. Protests happened in 104 American cities the night of the decision and are notable for the engagement of a new generation many thought too interested in partying.

Last night protesters came out in force when Obama came to LA for a Democratic Party fundraiser - led by Lt. Dan Choi, the West Point graduate and Arabic linguist fired for being gay. They see Obama putting off repealing 'don't ask, don't tell'.

One of the things which Obama repeatedly said during the campaign was that in order for him to help make change happen he needed to see a grass-roots movement piling on the pressure.

Anybody who’s been at an LGBT event with me can testify that my message is very explicit -- I don’t think that the gay and lesbian community, the LGBT community, should take its cues from me or some political leader in terms of what they think is right for them. It’s not my place to tell the LGBT community, "Wait your turn." I’m very mindful of Dr. King’s “Letter From Birmingham Jail,” where he says to the white clergy, "Don’t tell me to wait for my freedom."

Well, it's happening.

• Another Prop 8 postscript

To Chris Bryant and Ben Bradshaw: STFU

Cross posted from Wardman Wire

Both Ben Bradshaw and Chris Bryant have claimed ‘homophobia’ as a defence for their MP’s expenses claims.

Bryant says he had to ‘flip’ homes due to nasty smears (presumably emanating from the ‘underpants episode) being daubed on his Rhondda constituency home.

Bradshaw thinks the Telegraph is homophobic because it called his partner his “boyfriend”.

Neither of these claims are being accepted by readers of pinknews.co.uk, the LGBT news site where they appear.

Nor should they. The comment which most sums up my feelings being ‘What a pair of fantastic role models for young gay people to look up to - not’.

Bradshaw in particular seems to be resorting to a diversionary tactic which reminds me of ‘is it because I is black?’ Plus he tries to make out that gay MPs in general are being singled out saying “It is very interesting that gay Tory MPs have also been smeared” - because the Telegraph once referred to Nick Herbert’s “boyfriend” rather than using “partner”.

Bradshaw ignores the fact that since his government cow-towed to religious interests and refused to introduce gay marriage (something he has never, to my knowledge, done anything but defend), instead resorting to the sexual apartheid of civil partnerships - literally ‘different but equal’, they also refused to introduce a similar ‘non-religious’ status for heterosexuals - what the hell is his partner’s ‘official’ title? If anything it’s ‘civil partner’!

‘Boyfriend’ is only homophobic if you read it as such. I understand fully that some use it with that intent but you have to see it in context and the rest of the Telegraph piece on Bradshaw isn’t that.

Bryant, defending his ‘double flipping’ and claiming a total of £92,415 in second home expenses since 2004 plus a £77,000 profit made when he moved again, puts it all down to having to ‘escape homophobic thugs who daubed lewd messages’ on his main constituency property.

As pinknews.co.uk readers point out, if he were an actual role model he would have pursued them and made sure the South Wales police did their job - he wouldn’t have been driven out or taken the police’s advice to move.

Can you imagine the reaction to him from the black community if he was black and they were racist messages and he ran away from defending himself?

Plus there’s the small matter - as another commentator points out - that if one of his constituents were subject to homophobic attacks (and they weren’t living in social housing) they’d have to re-house themselves at their own cost.

Now that we have a great number and fair spread of out public figures in the UK - though not enough, think footballers - I think these comments display a bit of maturity in the gay community, like I think has happened in the black community. It’s no longer ‘my gay role model, right or wrong’.

Postscript: 'It's the economy faggot' - Dan Savage on Obama and LGBT rights

Savage also points out in his column how Obama made a joke of the progress on gay marriage at the White House Correspondents Dinner last Saturday.

The more I think about the joke Obama told at the WHCD the more ticked off I get. We're witnessing rapid and historic progress in the fight for gay equality and Barack Obama, who campaigned on our issues and described himself as a "fierce advocate" of gay and lesbian equality, hasn't acknowledged the breakthroughs in Iowa, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine in a setting or a with comments that are in any way equal to the significance of this historic moment. The best he can do—all he's willing to do—is toss off an Adam-Sandler-level joke.

'It's The Economy, Faggot'

Brilliant blog post by Andrew Sullivan, the influential conservative American blogger, about his sinking feeling about Obama and LGBT rights. It includes the shock news that a deadline looms for his US residency - he may have to return to the UK due to lack of federal gay relationship recognition and anti-HIV immigration rules.

'It's The Economy, Faggot' was a proposed book title related to him by Bob Hattoy, who was a gay and HIV+ Bill Clinton staffer.

He was going to write a memoir of working with people who thought of homosexual rights as wonderful things to say you support (especially if you're fundraising or at a Hollywood dinner party) but far, far too controversial to ever do anything about, let alone risk anything for. In the end, of course, the Clintons enacted a slew of brutally anti-gay measures - passing DOMA [Defence of marriage act], doubling the rate of gay discharges from the military, signing the ban on HIV-positive tourists and immigrants - and expected standing ovations as pioneers of civil rights. The pathetic gay rights leaders gave it to them, so delighted were they to have their checks cashed. The proposed title of Bob's book was a summary of the priorities of the Clinton years.

[Hattoy died before the memoir was written and published.]

Sullivan relates how he immensely impressed with Obama during the campaign and how Obama had stood up for LGBT rights in unlikely places, such as from the bully pulpit at Martin Luther King's church in the face of homophobic black preachers.

I listened to him in the early days and found him sincere

In this he had the same experience as myself. In this post I explored how:

On the trail he consistently mentioned the word and often.

This was in stark contrast to Hillary.

But nearly four months into Obama in power Sullivan has "a sickeningly familiar feeling in my stomach".

Here we are, in the summer of 2009, with gay servicemembers still being fired for the fact of their orientation. Here we are, with marriage rights spreading through the country and world and a president who cannot bring himself even to acknowledge these breakthroughs in civil rights, and having no plan in any distant future to do anything about it at a federal level. Here I am, facing a looming deadline to be forced to leave my American husband for good, and relocate abroad because the HIV travel and immigration ban remains in force and I have slowly run out of options (unlike most non-Americans with HIV who have no options at all).

And what is Obama doing about any of these things? What is he even intending at some point to do about these things? So far as I can read the administration, the answer is: nada. We're firing Arab linguists? So sorry. We won't recognize in any way a tiny minority of legally married couples in several states because they're, ugh, gay? We had no idea. There's a ban on HIV-positive tourists and immigrants? Really? Thanks for letting us know. Would you like to join Joe Solmonese and John Berry [leaders of the biggest national LGBT organisations in the USA] for cocktails? The inside of the White House is fabulous these days.

Yesterday, [White House Press Secretary] Robert Gibbs gave non-answer after non-answer on civil unions and Obama's clear campaign pledge to grant equal federal rights for gay couples; non-answer after non-answer on the military's remaining ban on honest service members. What was once a categorical pledge is now - well let's call it the toilet paper that it is. I spent yesterday trying to get a better idea of what's intended on all fronts, and the overwhelming sense - apart from a terror of saying anything about gay people on the record - is that we are in the same spot as in every Democratic administration: the well-paid leaders of the established groups get jobs and invites, and that's about it. Worse: we will get a purely symbolic, practically useless hate crimes bill that they will then wave in our faces to prove they need do nothing more.

I would add to this that the pogram against LGBT in Iraq, which is believed to be being supported by the Iraqi Interior Ministry, has seen absolutely no action from either the President or Hillary Clinton's State Department.

Sullivan's attitude to Obama mirrors my increasing distaste with the Labour Party on LGBT rights. See 'Brown opposes Prop. 8, refuses to act on homophobic Home Office' for more on that. Although Blair, like Clinton and Obama, spoke visibly of supporting LGBT rights, the reality with Blair was that most of New Labour's legal changes came about due to pressure from Europe. Brown, although voting the right way, has almost no record of visible support prior to becoming PM.

In one of his farewell speeches, Blair also sounded like Clinton is praising the 'nice gays':

What actually matters enormously is that the people from outside politics that you are trying to do it with have a sufficient intelligence and sensitivity, which I think has really defined the Stonewall campaign, I define it as a polite determination.

There is another parallel between the US and UK as the current gay legal interest here by groups like Stonewall is also with a hate crimes bill - rather than, say, the more politically difficult homophobia located in the Home Office or the failure to act in any way on the Iragi gay pogram.

Fortunately, LGBT Labour have a resolution on LGBT asylum and immigration up for debate at their AGM so it is to be hoped that Labour supporters will finally exert some pressure on that issue.

If Andrew Sullivan does have to - effectively - go into exile I can't think of a better symbol of how far the realities of LGBT life in America would be from the rhetoric exposed by the politician many enthusiastic voted for on November 5.

Gay Morrocco and Koranic anti-gay interpretations

News about 'Outrage sweeping across Morocco' following a gay association's announcement of a planned seminar on sexual problems led me to the video below.

The video tells the story of a gay couple's 'marriage', celebrated traditionally by their families and echoing centuries of actual Muslim tolerance of homosexuality.

It dramatically contradicts the news story which plies the same mythical line that certain churches and politicians in African states like Uganda have that "homosexuals have been attempting to infiltrate Moroccan culture".

It claims that "Moroccan authorities are in a very awkward situation since they are torn between European pressure and Morocco's conservative community".

Well good. The more pressure the better. As the video makes clear, you either support basic human rights or you don't. 'Culture' is no defence.

What's more, as with women's rights, it is not a case of 'change cannot happen because the Koran is clear'. The video explains how it's simply how it's interpreted - much like the bible - and some aspects highlighted and others ignored. Again, 'culture' is no defence' - and culture is not immutable.

This argument reflects those of the small but profoundly significant 'renaissance' movement amongst Muslims opposed to the likes of Saudi's Wahabbi's and Iran's rulers, saying there is another way. A movement which we're hear far too little about, instead we hear about zealots like Anjem Choudary.

HOMOSEXUALITY in MOROCCO & in ISLAM (part 1 - 5)

• Moroccan gay organisation Kifkif

Brown opposes Prop. 8, refuses to act on homophobic Home Office

Gordon Brown on his return from Washington:

"I was in America yesterday and I know you will be sorry I didn't bring Barack Obama back. He is coming soon. But what I saw in America told me what we have to do. This Proposition 8 [which banned gay marriage in California], this attempt to undo the good that has been done. This attempt to create divorces among 18,000 people who were perfectly legally brought together in partnerships, this is unacceptable and shows me why we always have to be vigilant, why we have always got to fight homophobic behaviour and any form of discrimination."

Speech by Peter Tatchell at Amnesty International headquarters on Friday 16 May 2008:

“Since 1999, the Labour government has repealed most of Britain’s anti-gay laws and introduced new legislation to recognise same-sex partnerships and protect gay people against discrimination.

“These positive gay rights measures are being undermined by Labour’s failure to tackle the homophobic and transphobic bias of the asylum system.

“We need urgent government action to implement five key policy changes to ensure a fair hearing for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) asylum applicants:

“First, all asylum staff and adjudicators should receive sexual orientation and transgender awareness training. They currently receive race and gender training but no training at all on sexual orientation and gender identity issues. As a result, they often make stereotyped assumptions: that a feminine woman can’t be a lesbian or that a masculine man cannot be gay. They sometimes rule that someone who has been married must be faking their homosexuality.

”Second, the government should issue explicit instructions to all immigration and asylum staff, and to all asylum judges, that homophobic and transphobic persecution are legitimate grounds for granting asylum. The government has never done this, which signals to asylum staff and judges that claims by LGBT people are not as worthy as those based on persecution because of a person’s ethnicity, gender, politics or faith.

”Third, the official Home Office country information reports - on which judges often rely when ruling on asylum applications - must be upgraded and expanded to reflect the true scale of anti-LGBT persecution. At the moment, the government’s documentation of anti-gay and anti-transgender persecution in individual countries is often partial, inaccurate and misleading. It consistently downplays the severity of victimisation suffered by LGBT people in violently homophobic countries like Pakistan, Uganda, Egypt, Nigeria, Iran, Cameroon, Iraq, Zimbabwe, Palestine and Saudi Arabia.

”Fourth, legal aid funding for asylum claims needs to be substantially increased. Existing funding levels are woefully inadequate. This means that most asylum applicants - gay and straight - are unable to prepare an adequate submission at their asylum hearing. Their solicitors don’t get paid enough to procure the necessary witness statements, medical reports and other vital corroborative evidence.

“Fifth, the Home Office needs to issue official instructions to asylum detention centre staff that they have a duty to stamp out anti-gay and anti-trans abuse, threats and violence. Many LGBT detainees report suffering homophobic victimisation, and say they fail to receive adequate protection and support from detention centre staff. These shortcomings need to be remedied by LGBT awareness training to ensure that detention centre staff take action against homophobic and transphobic perpetrators, and that they are committed to protect LGBT detainees who are being victimised.

“Labour’s claim to be a LGBT-friendly government rings hollow when it continues to fail genuine LGBT refugees. We must insist on an asylum system that is fair, just and compassionate – for LGBT refugees and for all refugees,” said Mr Tatchell.

Sample case histories of how the asylum system fails genuine LGBT refugees:

* Two years ago, Thando Dube embarked on a 33-day hunger strike in protest at being held in detention for six months. She was not a political dissident held by a brutal regime. She was a regular civilian who was incarcerated in a British asylum detention centre. Her crime? Thando is a lesbian who fled to the UK to escape the well-known persecution of LGBT people in Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwe.

* At least two gay Iranian asylum seekers have committed suicide in UK in the last five years, after being ordered by the Home Office to return to Iran. Israfil Shiri, aged 29, burned himself alive. Hussein Nasseri shot himself in the head. Both chose suicide rather than suffer deportation and probable execution by Iran’s ayatollahs.

* The Home Office insists that Jamaica is a “safe” country. Many LGBT Jamaican asylum applications are rejected, despite evidence from Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch that anti-gay attacks are widespread. In the Home Office’s view, gay Jamaicans can seek police protection. But the reality is, according to Amnesty, that “protection is often denied by the police, who in many cases appear to tacitly or actively support such violence.”

* Isaac K, aged 17, fled to Britain from Uganda after he was caught with his boyfriend. A mob, which included local officials, tried to kill him. According to the Home Office, what happened to Isaac does not constitute persecution and therefore he does not qualify for asylum.

* The Home Office likewise denies the abuse of gay men in Algeria. RK was jailed for homosexuality. In prison, he was raped and beaten by inmates and guards. His teeth were knocked out and he suffers from severe post-traumatic stress disorder. The Home Office insists that it is safe for RK to return to Algeria.

* Many LGBT victims are forcibly - even violently - deported back to their homophobic home countries. This happened to gay Jamaican, EB. He alleges violent beatings by Home Office-contracted security guards who forced him onto the plane. When he arrived in Kingston, his family say that he could barely walk.

These abuses are happening under a Labour government - a government that claims to support LGBT human rights.

I will add to Peter's proposals that LGBT asylum and immigration groups should be used, as the Canadian immigration minister has proposed, to help filter out false claims.

Designing out racism

One of the issues which I wrote about during the US election campaign was the meme, constantly repeated in the BBC's reporting, of the 'Bradley effect'. This is when people say they will but actually don't vote for the black candidate.

One of the odd issues with this is that in the campaign for California Governor in 1982, which this 'effect' is named after, race wasn't a factor (or at least a trivial one). The reason black candidate Tom Bradley lost was because a supposedly 'anti-gun' proposition turned out larger numbers than expected of rural and small town voters.

That sort of 'wedge' issue has been used elsewhere to bring out the vote, most notably the Republicans who used gay marriage propositions in this way in 2000 and 2004.








In a presentation at the TED conference, the baseball statistician cum political pollster guru Nate Silver of fivethirtyeight.com, who most accurately predicted the US election result, elaborated on the question of race in the elections using the presidential outcomes to draw out social and design implications.

He started off by talking about quite how big of a win Obama had.

Electoral maps between 2004 and 2008 show a profound shift towards blue, or liberal, voting. But there’s a block of states - centered on Arkansas, and roughly following the Appalachians - which voted more strongly against Obama than they did against Clinton. And in Louisiana, roughly 1 in 5 white voters told pollsters that race had been a factor in choosing not to vote for Obama - that compares to roughly 4% in states like New York and California.

This made no difference overall because these are less populated states with less national electoral weight.

There's little evidence of race deciding US elections recently and Silver has statistically dismantled its role.

But Silver turns these stats inside out to ask if racism is predictable.

He looked for relationships between independent variables and racism as an electoral factor and found a strong correlation - low education levels correlate closely with racial-based voting. Highly rural states also showed this pattern, though it’s less dramatic than the educational pattern.

The General Social Survey, asks “Does anyone of the opposite race live in your neighborhood?” And, the answers to this are stratified upon density: In the city, yes. In the suburbs, mainly yes. In rural areas, not nearly as much.

He looked at political affiliation - there are more Republicans in monoracial neighborhoods, but it’s not a dramatic difference. Similarly, there’s not much difference in opinion regarding affirmative action. But a question about interracial marriage gets dramatically different results in monoracial neighborhoods - people in these neighborhoods are twice as likely to support a law banning interracial marriage.

What he gleans from this is that if something is predictable then it is designable.

The goal is to facilitate interaction with people of other races. For example a university-based mixing program, sending students from NYU to the University of Arkansas as a form of cultural exchange.

More dramatically Silver suggested that you need to try to create interracial neighborhoods, to reengineer cities.

Cities designed in the 1970s and 80s might actually have helped America become more conservative under Reagan, he suggested.

He thinks that urban design is hugely important to achieving integration: grids vs the windy streets in many parts of suburbia, where grids are better. At the end of the day, he said cul de sacs lead to conservatives.

This idea also relates to a point made by the new black Attorney General, Eric Holder:

In a speech to Justice Department employees marking Black History Month, Holder said the workplace is largely integrated but Americans still self-segregate on the weekends and in their private lives.

Even when people mix at the workplace or afterwork social events, Holder argued, many Americans in their free time are still segregated inside what he called "race-protected cocoons."

"Saturdays and Sundays, America in the year 2009 does not in some ways differ significantly from the country that existed almost 50 years ago. This is truly sad," said Holder.

Although racism in the UK has a very different history I wonder if mapping answers to “does anyone of the opposite race live in your neighborhood?” correlates to BNP voting?

When gays riot

We're going to have to wait to see it until January but Shaun Penn's next Oscar winner will be 'Milk'.

The long-awaited biopic of the San Francisco gay supervisor Harvey Milk, assassinated alongside Mayor George Moscone in 1977, has just opened in the US.

Here's the trailer:



Harvey was an icon for the gay rights movement. He came just before my time but I still remember when I saw the biopic 'The Times of Harvey Milk' in the early eighties and came to learn more about him. Harvey changed the world.

It's just wonderful that Gus van Sant is the one to finally make this movie and all the reviews are great. It's extra great because the history will come back and people will get to see what was sacrificed to make the world we live in today.

This is especially good for young LGBT.

Here's some videos about that history.

Milk and Moscone's assassin, fellow San Francisco Supervisor (councilor) Dan White, got a very light sentence. This was 1977! Following this there was a candlelight parade and then a riot (the gay movement started with a riot at Stonewall).



Now California State Senator Carole Migden speaking so movingly about Harvey.



I'm such an old fart. I can totally relate to this aging queen, Cleve Jones, who worked with Harvey (and then went on to start the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt).



He speaks wisdom:

If your generation of young people do not know our history you will not be prepared to fight. History is full of examples of people who thought they were free and woke up and discovered they were not.

It's important for people to understand that Harvey Milk was an ordinary faggot. He was not a genius, he was not a saint. His personal life was in disarray. He was poverty stricken. He was an ordinary man and yet because he was honest. because he had courage and because he really did love his people and love his city he was able to change the world. And I want all young people to understand that they have the power to do that.

Just like Rosa Parks.

Gay San Francisco Supervisor Tom Ammiano adds to this point - Harvey was just like you and me:

Harvey was a mensch. He could also be a diva. He would have loved knowing that Sean Penn would be playing him.

At the moment there's a riotous anger in California because of the passage of Prop 8, blocking gay marriage.

Harvey's spirit lives on.

HT: This post is for Darren.

Could Obama lose?

Robert Kennedy Jr. on Rachel Maddow talking about the systematic and nationally organised blocking of the right-to-vote almost always from Democrats and poor people.

This expands on the article he wrote with Greg Palast in the current Rolling Stone, which Palast did a film for for the BBC's Newsnight.

Gary Younge did a very good roundup of all the bad stuff which has been reported in The Guardian today:

In short, come next Tuesday, the issue may not so much be who votes for whom, but who gets to vote and whose votes get counted. A recent CNN poll showed that 42% of voters are not confident their vote will be accurately cast and counted - almost three times the figure four years ago. With the record numbers of newly registered voters will be a record number of lawyers on both sides. If it's close, the courts may once again pick the winner.

This is a joke from the Simpsons, but it's actually happened.



Says Younge:

In Jackson County, West Virginia, people have been hitting the touch-screen for Barack Obama and finding they have voted for John McCain.

I've yet to see anywhere which is tallying up the likely electoral effect but going on the voter purge numbers suggested it's not actually enormous in a likely 130 million vote election. Significant, dirty and illegitimate - but not enormous.

[Though there are plenty of sites watching voter suppression such as
the Voter Suppression Wiki, SourceWatch’s Election Protection Wiki, the Election Fraud Blog and the Video the Vote project.]

The other demon to raise its head - all the time in BBC coverage, a meme so strong Ian Hislop smugly repeated it on Have I Got News For You on Friday as received wisdom - is the 'Bradley effect'.

The actual Bradley campaign reality bears no relationship to the meme. The reason Bradley lost was because a supposedly 'anti-gun' proposition turned out massive numbers of rural and small town voters not expected through polls.

This sort of 'wedge' tactic has been perfected since by numerous politicians, from John Howard, who used immigration, to George Bush, who used gay marriage. It drives the faithful to the polls, sometimes literally.

Mori's Bob Worcester demolished the idea that in 2008 it's a real effect when yet another BBC journalist raised it on 'Today' this morning, pointing out that there's no evidence from the last US elections in 2006 (and quoting Nate Silver that Obama has a '95.7% chance of winning'). Crankily responding to another question about it he said:

rather than instinct I'd actually prefer to go on what's actually happened.

If I was American I would be somewhat offended by the BBC's ignorance on race in the USA. Maybe they should do this story?

Prodded once again, Silver statistically dismantles 'Bradley' again today saying: Bradley Effect? Or Elephant Effect? — responding to an article by Republican consultant Bill Greener at Salon.com. Like Worcester, Nate also focuses on those 2006 elections.

Very, very little reported but even scarier is Naomi Wolf's belief that America is in the beginnings of a coup.

Yes, a coup.

Here she explains it more but basically she's looked at how all coup d’état start and America ticks all the boxes: secret prisons, mass surveillance. Plus following a typically rushed and secretive 'War On Terror' move, Bush has acquired legal rights to deploy US troops in mainland USA. There have been troop deployments in black ghettos like Oakland.

So some people think it's all going to end in tears and torture in 'black sites'....

However the real argument is will any of this dirty stuff work?

I think not, simply because Obama's lead is too great.

The traditional polls count things like likely voters and often, like Gallup's, base this on whether people have voted before. They are usually not taking account of either new voters or even people who use a mobile phone and not a land line.

But despite all these problems, which Nate Silver's excellent fivethirtyeight.com squeezes out, Obama still leads and leads by big numbers in the popular and electoral vote. It's obvious.

It is hard to imagine anything, even a terrorist attack or a Bin Laden video, eroding those numbers.

The sort of voter purge tactics being pursued only really work in much closer elections like the 2000 one - where 57000 people were removed from Florida's rolls - and in 2004 in Ohio.

Again, as Nate Silver has pointed out, the electoral map is such that Obama starts 2 electoral votes short of the number needed with enough solid, double-digit lead, 'blue' states.

Also, Republicans have en masse been fleeing the sinking ship. Particularly fiscally conservative and socially liberal ones - today he got the Financial Times endorsement. Even Palin has been breaking with the campaign tacticians, perhaps because she fears being blamed for a huge loss.

Against all the doom and gloom, which is not based on nothing, are a whole lot of other factors which have to be weighed.

Nothing leads me to think that the US will not have a black president in a week's time. It may well be a bit closer than some think now and the evidence suggests but it will still be a victory.

P.S. An interview with Nate on 'Today' is due ...

Postscript: been reminded by readers that 'in 2004 Kerry was polling strongly, right?'

Actually no. Here's Daniel Sinker:

Looking at polling results from the final days of the 2004 campaign paints a very different picture: With only three exceptions, Bush held the lead in 22 out of 25 polls going into election day. Those leads, which averaged 2.23% for Bush, very closely mirrored the final election outcome: a 2.45% margin of victory.

Sinker also discovered a - perhaps surprising - mirroring between Google Trends numbers for Obama/McCain and the actual poll numbers.

To be a Republican today ...

HT: Toby

To be a Republican today you need to believe:

1. Jesus loves you and shares your hatred of homosexuals and Hillary Clinton.

2. Saddam was a good guy when Reagan armed him, a bad guy when Bush's Daddy made war on him, a good guy when Cheney did business with him, and a bad guy when Bush needed a "we-can't-find-Bin-Laden" diversion.

3. Trade with Cuba is wrong because the country is Communist, but trade with China and Vietnam is vital to a spirit of international harmony.

4. The United States should get out of the United Nations, and our highest national priority is enforcing U.N. resolutions against Iran

5. A woman can't be trusted with decisions about her own body, but multinational drug corporations can make decisions affecting all mankind without regulation.

6. The best way to improve military morale is to praise the troops in speeches, while slashing veterans' benefits and combat pay.

7. If condoms are kept out of schools, adolescents won't have sex.

8. A good way to fight terrorism is to belittle our longtime allies, ("That's just old Europe- Donald Rumsfeld---Freedom Fries, --etc.) then demand their cooperation and money.

9. Providing health care to all Iraqis is sound policy, but providing health care to all Americans is socialism. HMO's and insurance companies have the best interests of the public at heart.

10. Global warming and tobacco's link to cancer are junk science, but creationism should be taught in schools.

11. A president lying about an extramarital affair is an impeachable offense, but a president lying to enlist support for a war in which thousands die is sol id defense policy.

12. Government should limit itself to the powers named in the Constitution, which include banning gay marriages and censoring the Internet.

13. The public has a right to know about Hillary's cattle trades, but George Bush's aviation and driving records are none of our business.

14. Being a drug addict is a moral failing and a crime, unless you're a conservative radio host. Then it's an illness and you need our prayers for your recovery.

15. Support for "Executive Privilege" in perpetuity for every Republican ever born, who will be born, or who might be born.

16. What Bill Clinton did in the 1960's is of vital national interest, but what Bush did in the '80's is irrelevant.

17. Support for hunters who shoot their friends and blame them for wearing orange vests similar to those worn by the quail.

Manipulation

She's avoiding the press.

Newsweek's Jonathan Alter predicts how the strategy will play out:

I'd imagine that Palin will dodge press conferences in favor of interviews with people like Sean Hannity [Fox], Larry King and Ellen DeGeneres. Then, when the media complain that she is being kept away, the McCain campaign will cite the half dozen or so interviews she has granted as proof that the campaign press is just bellyaching. Brief press "avails" on the plane will be useless, unless reporters ask open-ended queries designed to elicit proof of real knowledge.

That should get Palin through the next three weeks. By the end of the month, the McCain camp can say she has to go to ground to prepare for the Oct. 2 vice presidential debate, where expectations will be so low for Palin that she will likely emerge intact. It will be up to the press and public to raise enough of a stink about this, that Palin is forced to submit to real interviews with real questions that show whether her real-life experience is any preparation for assuming high office. In that sense, the Palin nomination is as much of a test of us as it is of her.

Open letter from Wasillian about Sarah Palin

This letter went viral very quickly. It contains a lot more detail which undercuts all the rhetoric about anti-corruption and fiscal conservatism. I followed a debate on a moderate Republican blog just after it emerged about it and they weren't happy.

Source: local Alaskan blog Mudflats which has a heck of a lot more local background than the MSM. HIGHLY recommended.

The latest story the National Enquirer is working on is that Palin had an affair with Todd’s ex-business partner in an Anchorage Car Wash venture. This was an interesting twist because it was also rumored that Todd Palin had an “Edwards problem”. Maybe he has an Elizabeth Edwards problem. I generally try to resist getting too caught up in the smarminess, unless it becomes impossible. It just did.

Two days ago, Todd’s ex-business partner filed an emergency motion to have his divorce papers sealed. Yesterday the motion was DENIED.

Buckle up. I’ll post updates and links…unless the entire intertube network collapses first

Etc.

From Anne Kilkenny

Dear friends,

So many people have asked me about what I know about Sarah Palin in the last 2 days that I decided to write something up . . .

Basically, Sarah Palin and Hillary Clinton have only 2 things in common: their gender and their good looks. :)

You have my permission to forward this to your friends/email contacts with my name and email address attached, but please do not post it on any websites, as there are too many kooks out there . . .

Thanks,

Anne

ABOUT SARAH PALIN

I am a resident of Wasilla, Alaska. I have known Sarah since 1992. Everyone here knows Sarah, so it is nothing special to say we are on a first-name basis. Our children have attended the same schools. Her father was my child's favorite substitute teacher. I also am on a first name basis with her parents and mother-in-law. I attended more City Council meetings during her administration than about 99% of the residents of the city.

She is enormously popular; in every way she's like the most popular girl in middle school. Even men who think she is a poor choice and won't vote for her can't quit smiling when talking about her because she is a "babe".

It is astonishing and almost scary how well she can keep a secret. She kept her most recent pregnancy a secret from her children and parents for seven months.

She is "pro-life". She recently gave birth to a Down's syndrome baby. There is no cover-up involved, here; Trig is her baby.

She is energetic and hardworking. She regularly worked out at the gym.

She is savvy. She doesn't take positions; she just "puts things out there" and if they prove to be popular, then she takes credit.

Her husband works a union job on the North Slope for BP and is a champion snowmobile racer. Todd Palin's kind of job is highly sought-after because of the schedule and high pay. He arranges his work schedule so he can fish for salmon in Bristol Bay for a month or so in summer, but by no stretch of the imagination is fishing their major source of income. Nor has her life-style ever been anything like that of native Alaskans.

Sarah and her whole family are avid hunters.

She's smart.

Her experience is as mayor of a city with a population of about 5,000 (at the time), and less than 2 years as governor of a state with about 670,000 residents.

During her mayoral administration most of the actual work of running this small city was turned over to an administrator. She had been pushed to hire this administrator by party power-brokers after she had gotten herself into some trouble over precipitous firings which had given rise to a recall campaign.

Sarah campaigned in Wasilla as a "fiscal conservative". During her 6 years as Mayor, she increased general government expenditures by over 33%. During those same 6 years the amount of taxes collected by the City increased by 38%. This was during a period of low inflation (1996-2002). She reduced progressive property taxes and increased a regressive sales tax which taxed even food. The tax cuts that she promoted benefited large corporate property owners way more than they benefited residents.

The huge increases in tax revenues during her mayoral administration weren't enough to fund everything on her wish list though, borrowed money was needed, too. She inherited a city with zero debt, but left it with indebtedness of over $22 million. What did Mayor Palin encourage the voters to borrow money for? Was it the infrastructure that she said she supported? The sewage treatment plant that the city lacked? or a new library? No. $1m for a park. $15m-plus for construction of a multi-use sports complex which she rushed through to build on a piece of property that the City didn't even have clear title to, that was still in litigation 7 yrs later--to the delight of the lawyers involved! The sports complex itself is a nice addition to the community but a huge money pit, not the profit-generator she claimed it would be. She also supported bonds for $5.5m for road projects that could have been done in 5-7 yrs without any borrowing.

While Mayor, City Hall was extensively remodeled and her office redecorated more than once.

These are small numbers, but Wasilla is a very small city.

As an oil producer, the high price of oil has created a budget surplus in Alaska. Rather than invest this surplus in technology that will make us energy independent and increase efficiency, as Governor she proposed distribution of this surplus to every individual in the state.

In this time of record state revenues and budget surpluses, she recommended that the state borrow/bond for road projects, even while she proposed distribution of surplus state revenues: spend today's surplus, borrow for needs.

She's not very tolerant of divergent opinions or open to outside ideas or compromise. As Mayor, she fought ideas that weren't generated by her or her staff. Ideas weren't evaluated on their merits, but on the basis of who proposed them.

While Sarah was Mayor of Wasilla she tried to fire our highly respected City Librarian because the Librarian refused to consider removing from the library some books that Sarah wanted removed. City residents rallied to the defense of the City Librarian and against Palin's attempt at out-and-out censorship, so Palin backed down and withdrew her termination letter. People who fought her attempt to oust the Librarian are on her enemies list to this day.

Sarah complained about the "old boy's club" when she first ran for Mayor, so what did she bring Wasilla? A new set of "old boys". Palin fired most of the experienced staff she inherited. At the City and as Governor she hired or elevated new, inexperienced, obscure people, creating a staff totally dependent on her for their jobs and eternally grateful and fiercely loyal--loyal to the point of abusing their power to further her personal agenda, as she has acknowledged happened in the case of pressuring the State's top cop (see below).

As Mayor, Sarah fired Wasilla's Police Chief because he "intimidated" her, she told the press. As Governor, her recent firing of Alaska's top cop has the ring of familiarity about it. He served at her pleasure and she had every legal right to fire him, but it's pretty clear that an important factor in her decision to fire him was because he wouldn't fire her sister's ex-husband, a State Trooper. Under investigation for abuse of power, she has had to admit that more than 2 dozen contacts were made between her staff and family to the person that she later fired, pressuring him to fire her ex-brother-in-law. She tried to replace the man she fired with a man who she knew had been reprimanded for sexual harassment; when this caused a public furor, she withdrew her support.

She has bitten the hand of every person who extended theirs to her in help. The City Council person who personally escorted her around town introducing her to voters when she first ran for Wasilla City Council became one of her first targets when she was later elected Mayor. She abruptly fired her loyal City Administrator; even people who didn't like the guy were stunned by this ruthlessness.

Fear of retribution has kept all of these people from saying anything publicly about her.

When then-Governor Murkowski was handing out political plums, Sarah got the best, Chair of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission: one of the few jobs not in Juneau and one of the best paid. She had no background in oil & gas issues. Within months of scoring this great job which paid $122,400/yr, she was complaining in the press about the high salary. I was told that she hated that job: the commute, the structured hours, the work. Sarah became aware that a member of this Commission (who was also the State Chair of the Republican Party) engaged in unethical behavior on the job. In a gutsy move which some undoubtedly cautioned her could be political suicide, Sarah solved all her problems in one fell swoop: got out of the job she hated and garnered gobs of media attention as the patron saint of ethics and as a gutsy fighter against the "old boys' club" when she dramatically quit, exposing this man's ethics violations (for which he was fined).

As Mayor, she had her hand stuck out as far as anyone for pork from Senator Ted Stevens.

Lately, she has castigated his pork-barrel politics and publicly humiliated him. She only opposed the "bridge to nowhere" after it became clear that it would be unwise not to.

As Governor, she gave the Legislature no direction and budget guidelines, then made a big grandstand display of line-item vetoing projects, calling them pork. Public outcry and further legislative action restored most of these projects--which had been vetoed simply because she was not aware of their importance--but with the unobservant she had gained a reputation as "anti-pork".

She is solidly Republican: no political maverick. The State party leaders hate her because she has bit them in the back and humiliated them. Other members of the party object to her self-description as a fiscal conservative.

Around Wasilla there are people who went to high school with Sarah. They call her "Sarah Barracuda" because of her unbridled ambition and predatory ruthlessness. Before she became so powerful, very ugly stories circulated around town about shenanigans she pulled to be made point guard on the high school basketball team. When Sarah's mother-in-law, a highly respected member of the community and experienced manager, ran for Mayor, Sarah refused to endorse her.

As Governor, she stepped outside of the box and put together of package of legislation known as "AGIA" that forced the oil companies to march to the beat of her drum.

Like most Alaskans, she favors drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. She has questioned if the loss of sea ice is linked to global warming. She campaigned "as a private citizen" against a state initiaitive that would have either a) protected salmon streams from pollution from mines, or b) tied up in the courts all mining in the state (depending on who you listen to). She has pushed the State's lawsuit against the Dept. of the Interior's decision to list polar bears as threatened species.

McCain is the oldest person to ever run for President; Sarah will be a heartbeat away from being President.

There has to be literally millions of Americans who are more knowledgeable and experienced than she.

However, there's a lot of people who have underestimated her and are regretting it.

CLAIM VS FACT

*"Hockey mom": true for a few years.
*"PTA mom": true years ago when her first-born was in elementary school, not since.
*"NRA supporter": absolutely true
*social conservative: mixed. Opposes gay marriage, BUT vetoed a bill that would have denied benefits to employees in same-sex relationships (said she did this because it was unconsitutional).
*pro-creationism: mixed. Supports it, BUT did nothing as Governor to promote it.
*"Pro-life": mixed. Knowingly gave birth to a Down's syndrome baby BUT declined to call a special legislative session on some pro-life legislation
*"Experienced": Some high schools have more students than Wasilla has residents. Many cities have more residents than the state of Alaska. No legislative experience other than City Council. Little hands-on supervisory or managerial experience; needed help of a city administrator to run town of about 5,000.
*political maverick: not at all
*gutsy: absolutely!
*open & transparent: ??? Good at keeping secrets. Not good at explaining actions.
*has a developed philosophy of public policy: no
*"a Greenie": no. Turned Wasilla into a wasteland of big box stores and disconnected parking lots. Is pro-drilling off-shore and in ANWR.
*fiscal conservative: not by my definition!
*pro-infrastructure: No. Promoted a sports complex and park in a city without a sewage treatment plant or storm drainage system. Built streets to early 20th century standards.
*pro-tax relief: Lowered taxes for businesses, increased tax burden on residents
*pro-small government: No. Oversaw greatest expansion of city government in Wasilla's history.
*pro-labor/pro-union. No. Just because her husband works union doesn't make her pro-labor. I have seen nothing to support any claim that she is pro-labor/pro-union.

WHY AM I WRITING THIS?

First, I have long believed in the importance of being an informed voter. I am a voter registrar. For 10 years I put on student voting programs in the schools. If you google my name (Anne Kilkenny + Alaska), you will find references to my participation in local government, education, and PTA/parent organizations.

Secondly, I've always operated in the belief that "Bad things happen when good people stay silent". Few people know as much as I do because few have gone to as many City Council meetings.

Third, I am just a housewife. I don't have a job she can bump me out of. I don't belong to any organization that she can hurt. But, I am no fool; she is immensely popular here, and it is likely that this will cost me somehow in the future: that's life.

Fourth, she has hated me since back in 1996, when I was one of the 100 or so people who rallied to support the City Librarian against Sarah's attempt at censorship.

Fifth, I looked around and realized that everybody else was afraid to say anything because they were somehow vulnerable.

CAVEATS

I am not a statistician. I developed the numbers for the increase in spending & taxation 2 years ago (when Palin was running for Governor) from information supplied to me by the Finance Director of the City of Wasilla, and I can't recall exactly what I adjusted for: did I adjust for inflation? for population increases? Right now, it is impossible for a private person to get any info out of City Hall--they are swamped. So I can't verify my numbers.

You may have noticed that there are various numbers circulating for the population of Wasilla, ranging from my "about 5,000", up to 9,000. The day Palin's selection was announced a city official told me that the current population is about 7,000. The official 2000 census count was 5,460. I have used about 5,000 because Palin was Mayor from 1996 to 2002, and the city was growing rapidly in the mid-90's.

Anne Kilkenny
August 31, 2008

Postscript: Anne interviewed on NPR