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This morning, Lloyd Blankfein, the head of one of the most prestigious investment firms in America released a video on YouTube for the Human Rights Campaign. Supporting equal rights for same-sex marriage.

So, kudos to you, Lloyd. I don’t own any shares of Goldman Sachs – or any investment bank for that matter. But, as an ordinary American who thinks our Constitution and Bill of Rights mandate equal opportunity that is still denied by today’s generation of conservatives, Republicans, Tea Party types, right-wing priests and pundits – welcome aboard!

Is your mayor in the picture?
Daylife/Reuters Pictures used by permission

Mayors of about 80 U.S. cities from New York to Los Angeles to Houston are backing a campaign to remove legal barriers to same-sex marriage nationwide.

“The more support we build in our cities and states, the stronger case we can make for extending the freedom to marry to loving couples no matter where they live,” Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa of Los Angeles said…at a news briefing on the issue. Same-sex marriage is illegal under California law.

Legislators in Washington, New Jersey and Maryland are pushing measures to permit the practice, while voters in North Carolina and Minnesota will face ballot questions this year on banning it. Federal law doesn’t recognize same-sex marriages, which are legal in New York, Iowa, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts and the District of Columbia.

“Law-abiding, tax-paying families and their children deserve the same opportunities, the same rights and the same responsibilities afforded to every other family,” said Villaraigosa, a Democrat, at the briefing in Washington, where the U.S. Conference of Mayors is meeting. He spoke in support of Freedom to Marry, a New York-based advocacy group that says bans discriminate against homosexuals and infringe on their rights…

“On average in New York City, 700 gay and lesbian couples are now getting married at the city clerk’s offices” each month, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said. “That means every month, hundreds of more parents and children are gaining the economic stability and protections that come with being a formal family unit.”

The mayor added that the change has been an economic boon for the largest U.S. city. He has said that the new law helps companies attract top talent and draws same-sex couples as tourists, including some who intend to marry while in New York…

Efforts to make the practice legal gained momentum in 2003, when the top Massachusetts court ruled 4-3 that a ban was unconstitutional. In 2004, the city of San Francisco initiated a court battle by letting gay couples wed. Massachusetts became the first state to permit same-sex marriage in May of that year.

Like so many civil rights struggles, though religious fundamentalists form the bastion of reactionary opposition, the issue of marriage equality encourages many more people to rethink the bigotry that props up the intellectual dishonesty and fear that denies equal opportunities to all citizens of this nation.

Ntlhoi Motsamai – Speaker of the National Assembly

Lesotho sits like pearl in a shell, surrounded by the land mass of South Africa. But this tiny kingdom of 1.8 million people boasts another jewel, which is perhaps astonishing given its size.

Lesotho is ranked eighth in the world by the World Economic Forum when it comes to bridging the gap between the sexes. The reasons are cultural, political and economic, but one explanation keeps being repeated when you probe the gender issue, and it relates to Lesotho’s recent past.

Historically, large numbers of men from Lesotho crossed the border to work in South Africa’s mines, forcing women to step into their shoes and take up school places and jobs. Many of the men have now come back, having been retrenched from the mines, and they face a more female-focused world.

Dr Mphu Ramatlapeng, Lesotho’s minister for health and social affairs, attributes this to the government’s pro-women policies. But more than that, she emphasises Lesotho’s culture of learning. “The defining factor is education. I think a lot of women have realised early on that they have to educate their daughters,” she says.

Primary education is free in Lesotho and literacy rates among women exceed those of men – with 95% of women able to read and write, compared with 83% of men. This is filtering into the jobs market – the chief of police is a woman, so too is the speaker of parliament and there are at least a dozen senior female judges presiding over the country’s courts…

Fifty per cent of Lesotho’s population live in the rural areas. Until recently, customary laws applied in the countryside dictated that women were virtually redundant when it came to making key decisions in the home…

The statistics that put Lesotho at the top table in the equality game may look impressive but they risk glossing over the challenges. There may be less of a gap in health, education and political participation than in many other countries, and clearly there is greater political will to recognise the important role of women in society.

The article walks away from the ideological quotient. Religion is a powerful factor in a society still stuck into peasant lifestyles, rural world view. A contradiction in terms if there ever was one.

The predominant religious force is Christianity. The missionaries who accompanied colonial exploitation did their job well. Fortunately, folks haven’t much of a tendency towards Lord’s Army nutballism. Still, acceptance of the status quo, Christian fatalism, distracts attempts to modernize further.

Daylife/AP Photo used by permission

Hawaii’s Senate has given final passage to a measure legalizing same-sex unions in the state, and Gov. Neil Abercrombie has said he will sign it.

The state House had already passed the bill, which “extends the same rights, benefits, protections and responsibilities of spouses in a marriage to partners in a civil union,” according to the Legislature’s website. It will take effect January 1, 2012…

“I have always believed that civil unions respect our diversity, protect people’s privacy and reinforce our core values of equality and aloha,” Abercrombie said in a statement. “For me, this bill represents equal rights for all the people of Hawaii…”

Five states and the District of Columbia issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Hawaii will join New Jersey in allowing civil unions.

Voters in Hawaii appear to have elected someone capable of bringing their personal politics into the 21st Century. Here in New Mexico we’ve been relegated to a “same old solution” resolution to our last election. Being Hispanic, Catholic, much beloved by police departments was an edge unable overcome by an exceptionally lackluster Democrat.

History tends to resolve the stupidity and inequity of human behavior grounded in superstition and hatred. But, it seems to take an inordinate length of time. Extending equal civil rights to all citizens seems to be a no-brainer; but, we often have an excess of fools without brains. They also get one vote apiece.

A federal judge in San Francisco decided today that gays and lesbians have a constitutional right to marry, striking down Proposition 8, the voter approved ballot measure that banned same-sex unions.

U.S. District Chief Judge Vaughn R. Walker said Proposition 8, passed by voters in November 2008, violated the federal constitutional rights of gays and lesbians to marry the partners of their choice.. His ruling is expected to be appealed to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals and then up to the U.S. Supreme Court.

[Updated at 1:54 p.m PDT.: "Plaintiffs challenge Proposition 8 under the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment," the judge wrote. "Each challenge is independently meritorious, as Proposition 8 both unconstitutionally burdens the exercise of the fundamental right to marry and creates an irrational classification on the basis of sexual orientation."

Vaughn added: "Plaintiffs seek to have the state recognize their committed relationships, and plaintiffs’ relationships are consistent with the core of the history, tradition and practice of marriage in the United States.“

Ultimately, the judge concluded that Proposition 8 "fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license. Indeed, the evidence shows Proposition 8 does nothing more than enshrine in the California Constitution the notion that opposite-sex couples are superior to same-sex couples. … Because Proposition 8 prevents California from fulfilling its constitutional obligation to provide marriages on an equal basis, the court concludes that Proposition 8 is unconstitutional.”]

Civil Rights get to take a few breaths of fresh air in the United States – for a while.

The challenge of dealing with a Supreme Court populated by reactionaries and staffed with Federalist zealots still lies ahead for our nation.

Mexico City’s tourism minister Thursday offered a free honeymoon to the first gay couple to wed in Argentina after that country made Latin American history by legalizing same-sex marriages.

The offer was “in recognition of tolerance, but also to promote gay friendly tourism in Mexico City,” said Alejandro Rojas, according to a statement…

Authorities in the Mexican capital, which legalized gay marriage last year, offered air tickets for the first couple to benefit from the Argentine law, and was seeking sponsorship from hotels and restaurants in Mexico City and the beach resort of Cancun, Rojas said.

Around 15 percent of world tourism — 150 million tourists per year — is gay friendly, while gay tourists are discerning, respectful and spend 47 percent more than heterosexual tourists, Rojas added.

Mexico City approved gay marriage and opened the way for adoptions last December, provoking a wave of uproar from religious groups and conservatives including President Felipe Calderon [and other ignorant homophobes].

Mexico City’s leftist government has pioneered liberal legislation in the past 13 years, including the decriminalization of abortion in 2007.

Our native racists used to attempt their brand of “humor” when the civil rights movement offered anti-discriminatory legislation. Often saying – like today’s Tea Party hypocrites – you can’t legislate us into loving you.

The same applies to ordinary human beings who happen to be homosexual vs. homophobic bigots.

Daylife/Reuters Pictures used by permission

The State Department will offer equal benefits and protections to same-sex partners of American diplomats, according to an internal memorandum Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton sent last week to an association of gay and lesbian Foreign Service officers.

Mrs. Clinton said the policy change addressed an inequity in the treatment of domestic partners and would help the State Department recruit diplomats, since many international employers already offered such benefits.

“Like all families, our Foreign Service families come in different configurations; all are part of the common fabric of our post communities abroad,” Mrs. Clinton said in the memorandum, a copy of which was provided to The New York Times by a member of the gay and lesbian association.

“At bottom,” she said, “the department will provide these benefits for both opposite-sex and same-sex partners because it is the right thing to do…”

Influential lawmakers also pushed for the changes — even drafting legislation requiring the State Department to offer these benefits — until Mrs. Clinton assured them that she would address the issue.

The “right thing to do” hardly influences bible-thumping reactionaries who could care less about equal opportunities, equal responsibilities or equal rights. We’ll probably get to hear them whining, tomorrow morning.

Good for you, Hillary!

Successful plaintiffs and their twin sons

The Connecticut Supreme Court has ruled that gay and lesbian couples have the right to get married…

“Interpreting our state constitutional provisions in accordance with firmly established equal protection principles leads inevitably to the conclusion that gay persons are entitled to marry the otherwise qualified same sex partner of their choice,” the ruling said.

“To decide otherwise would require us to apply one set of constitutional principles to gay persons and another to all others. The guarantee of equal protection under the law, and our obligation to uphold that command, forbids us from doing so. In accordance with these state constitutional requirements, same sex couples cannot be denied the freedom to marry.”

The decision would only allow gay couples the state benefits of marriage. The Defense of Marriage Act, passed in 1996, denies gay couples federal recognition of state marriages, which provides for federal benefits with regard to Social Security, taxation, immigration and others.

Who knows? Perhaps a dramatic overhaul of both Congress and the White House might leave the nation with a government that thoroughly rejects second-class citizenship?

It’s been almost fifty years since the first time I was arrested for daring to sit next to a Black friend at a White-Only drugstore counter. The miserable bastards who saddle this nation with discriminatory laws – still get more respect and attention from our lawmakers than anyone who cares about freedom and justice.

AP Photo by Mario G. Reyes

Star Treks’ Mister Sulu has agreed to live long and prosper — with his long time partner.

George Takei, Mr. Sulu on the original “Star Trek,” used to dream of a future where unimaginable things would happen. Well, his dream came true. Sunday he legally married his partner of 21 years, Brad Altman.

Their legal marriage became possible this year when the California Supreme Court overturned the state ban on gay marriage.

But their marriage knot could be undone by a ballot initiative to once again ban same-sex marriage.

As a child during World War II, Takei and his family were forcibly removed to interment camps with tens-of-thousands of other Japanese Americans. He held his wedding at Los Angeles’ Japanese American National Museum to make a point.

“We as gay Americans, we’ve been stereotyped and characterized as something frightening and threatening as Japanese Americans were before the war,” Takei said.

The United States has long been the standard bearer for democracy. Our record on bigotry and second-class citizenship – has been much, much less.

Certainly, everyone has a right to an opinion on how people live and love. They do not have a right or an ethical imperative to continue to deny equal rights to anyone.