Gay Rights

I am writing in reference to a story that appeared in the May 27, 2010 issue of the Washington Blade regarding Gov. Martin O'Malley's recent appearance at an event sponsored by the Gill Action Fund, a group of wealthy LGBT political activists (http://tinyurl.com/25ve6xu). Both the Gill Action Fund and Governor O'Malley have lost credibility in my view. Despite this, I still plan to volunteer and vote for Mr. O'Malley. He's a lot better than the alternative, and while he has consistently stated he is opposed to same-sex marriage, he has also pledged he would sign a marriage equality bill if it made it to his desk.

To hear top elected officials talk, you'd think the prospects for legalizing same-sex marriages in Maryland anytime soon were as remote as a return to the moon. But that's not what the state's residents are saying. A new poll by The Washington Post has found that support for gay marriage is growing among registered voters in the state, making the issue one that the General Assembly almost inevitably will have to address during its next four-year term. The poll, conducted May 3-6, found that registered voters favored legalizing same-sex marriages 48 percent to 43 percent.

There are two interesting things about Virginia Gov. Robert F. McDonnell's executive directive this week banning discrimination in the state government's personnel actions on the basis of sexual orientation. The first is that Mr. McDonnell, pilloried during the 2009 campaign for the conservative social views expressed in his graduate thesis, would take such an action at all. And the second is the broad reasoning he used to support it. Mr. McDonnell gained national attention last fall when his opponent, Democrat Creigh Deeds, started making an issue of the Republican's thesis as a graduate student at Regent University, which, among other things, took a dim view of "cohabitators, homosexuals or fornicators."

T he election last week of Roslyn Brock of Maryland as the new chairwoman of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People again marked a generational shift in leadership of the nation's oldest civil rights group. Ms. Brock, 44, and NAACP President Benjamin Jealous, 37, are the youngest to hold their positions in the organization's history, and both have pledged to make it relevant to African-Americans born after the high tide of the civil rights movement. But how exactly do Ms. Brock and Mr. Jealous intend to signal the new direction in which they want to take the organization?

The election last week of Roslyn Brock of Maryland as the new chairwoman of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People again marked a generational shift in leadership of the nation's oldest civil rights group. Ms. Brock, 44, and NAACP President Benjamin Jealous, 37, are the youngest to hold their positions in the organization's history, and both have pledged to make it relevant to African-Americans born after the high tide of the civil rights movement. But how exactly do Ms. Brock and Mr. Jealous intend to signal the new direction in which they want to take the organization?

BOSTON - - There is something fitting about writing my last column just as the new year begins. January, after all, is named for the Roman god of beginnings and endings. He looked backward and forward at the same time. So, this morning, do I. I wish I could find the right language to describe this rite of passage. Retirement, that swoon of a word, just won't do. The Spanish translation, jubilacion, is a bit over the top for my own mix of feelings. The phrase that kept running through my head as I considered this next step was: "I'm letting myself go."

On Saturday, Houston Controller Annise Parker soundly defeated attorney Gene Locke in that city's mayoral election in a campaign that centered on the budget, public safety and other perennial issues of municipal governance. As far as Houston voters are concerned, the election marked a milestone because Ms. Parker managed to defeat the candidate favored by the city's business establishment. Now she's at work finding ways to solidify city finances and looking for a new police chief. You may have heard about this election for another reason: Ms. Parker is gay. Much is being made of that now - of the odd circumstance of the election of an openly gay candidate in a city that has rejected giving benefits to the same-sex partners of city workers, in a state that has outlawed gay marriage, and at a time when gay-rights issues are facing an uphill struggle even in liberal states like Maine, New York and New Jersey.

ALBERT L. GORDON, 94 Gay rights advocate Albert L. Gordon, an attorney who helped advance gay rights in the 1970s and 1980s by challenging discriminatory practices and laws, including a successful effort to decriminalize consensual homosexual acts, died Aug. 10 in Los Angeles. He was 94. His death was due to old age, said his son Harold Gordon. Albert Gordon, a heterosexual whose twin sons are gay, became a lawyer in his late 40s and devoted most of his practice to defending the rights of homosexuals and battling the bigotry of law enforcement.