On last night's Daily Show, Jon Stewart made a sharp observation about the absurdity of our leaders. Essentially, they will go to any length to protect us, including torture, unless it involves boys who like boys, because, you know, ew.

(Don't Ask Don't Tell bit starts at 3:20 in the clip below)

In yesterday's New York Times, Frank Rich gave us a great piece about the current state of the culture wars and how we Americans don't have the time or patience for these arguments over "moral" issues (that the right has used quite effectively to keep us divided over the past thirty years or so). When you think about it, it was rather impressive that they were able to mobilize and had such stamina to keep folks fired up on both sides of issues like reproductive choice, gay rights, and abstinence-only education for so many years.

Over the past few months, we've watched as the result of years of greed, fiscal irresponsibility, and unnecessary risk-taking on Wall Street have nearly completely collapsed the global economy. In the back of our minds, we knew this would happen someday; it was impossible that such a level of grotesque consumption and consumerism could sustain for the long-term.

If you think about it, this is very similar to what has happened to the social conservatives as well.  We all knew that their holier-than-though messages regarding their version of "family values" stank to high heaven of...

I believe that today I have read the clear and indisputable proof that marriage equality will become a reality in this country during the Obama presidency. And the reason is not because Obama is going to propose a change in the law. Today I saw the clear sign that the debate has shifted and that Obama had everything to do with that shift.

Bob Barr, former presidential candidate for the Libertarian party, wrote the Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA, in 1996, when he was a Republican representative in the House. Yesterday he published a letter in the LA Times in which he argues for the repeal of DOMA.

Bob Barr is a libertarian who wants to limit government, the federal government most particularly. DOMA, in his view limits the states and limits the constitution’s “full faith and credit” clause. States recognize each others’ marriages on the basis of this clause. They recognize Nevada’s marriages as well as those of Florida. DOMA prohibits the recognition of same-sex marriages and this, in the view of Barr, is an infringement of states' rights.

He is clear that he doesn’t propose to repeal DOMA in order to give more rights to LGBT people. But neither do I detect in his letter any regret that such a repeal would likely make marriage equality a reality. His principle holds that states should decide...

According to my mom, I was a "good little boy" who didn't cry much and seemed to be happy most of the time. I was a small boy with strawberry blonde hair and a smattering of freckles across my face. My mom has told me that I was very sensitive to how others were feeling and that I was always very curious.  I started talking and reading fairly young and often drove my parents and grandparents to the brink of insanity with my constant questions of hows and whys about the world and how things worked.  I remember being allowed to play dress up in high heels and makeup, and spending hours in the kitchen alternating between creating new recipes (all of which my brave grandmother willingly tasted) and dissecting the hearts, gizzards, and other organs that came with the turkeys cooked for Thanksgiving dinners.  I didn't care much for sports and preferred to spend my afternoons putting on puppet shows or switching between playing beauty shop and operating room in my grandmother's front bathroom where my clients and patients were one and the same (you always want to have gorgeous hair when having an appendectomy!).

I also remember being treated differently than other children at a very early age.  Okay, maybe I was a little weird and precocious, but I noticed that there was something about me that made parents...

It is hard to swallow the news that Pastor Rick Warren will give the invocation at Obama's inauguration. I find it hard to see anything but a cynical political ploy that deliberately insults LGBT people to show the country that Obama is not a pandering politician. President Obama wants to show that he is America's president and can build bridges across old divides in this country. 

It is hard to swallow, because is shows that I am part of the country that can be insulted for political gain, even by this President who gave such hope. It is a political decision of course, all of Obama's decisions are. And he made a calculation that in order to show the big tent he is creating, some will just have to put up and shut up.

It reminds me of the times in his South Carolina campaign. He invited Donnie McClurkin to sing. McClurkin is of course the very vocal ex-gay gospel singer who let's no opportunity go by to "show" that gay people can change. Obama at that point gave an interview for the Advocate about this choice and he said then that we all have to learn to live together in a big tent. But he was saying that to LGBT people and basically asked...