As soon as I finish this post, I’ll head downtown to begin volunteering at Outfest, LA’s gay and lesbian film festival.  This will be my tenth consecutive year working for the organization.

I have been such a regular volunteer for this festival for a great variety of reasons — even if I sometimes question some of the choices of the programming department — including an overall support of the organization’s mission (I believe film can be an important vehicle to promote a greater understanding of gay men and lesbians) and an appreciation for their attitude toward volunteers.

This may sound like hyperbole, but it’s true:  I have never volunteered for a gay organization that has shown greater respect for its volunteers.  I can no longer count the times I have been thanked for my efforts.  Having supervised volunteers for nine years, I strive to express the same gratitude.  Outfest allows volunteers to see films for free (on a space available basis) and holds annual cookouts, both before and after the festival, to thank returning volunteers and the current year’s volunteers, respectively.

Recently discussing the way Outfest treats its volunteers with a friend on the left, also enthusiastic about the festival, he too contrasted the organization with other gay groups and suggested that some have this kind of expectation of activism, that they believe gay individuals “owe” it to the community to give of their time.  Thus, they take our efforts for granted, with an acquaintance reporting that when he recently volunteered at the LA banquet of a national gay organization, his supervisor wouldn’t allow him a bathroom break.

It’s as if they feel we should be honored to be able to volunteer our time.

So, once again, kudos to Outfest for the gratitude it shows to its volunteers.  May other gay organizations follow its example.

Among the many constants in my posts on gay marriage ever since we were at blogspot has been a plea for civil discourse on the issue.  I have faulted gay marriage advocates for being more ready to trash the opponents of state recognition of same-sex marriage than to defend the merits of the institution.  Simply put, they would rather whine on how miserable we are because the state deprives us of a right that they already have and lament how the failure of the state to call our unions marriage has caused incredible damage to our self-esteem.

If you feel a victim because the state doesn’t call your union what you want to call it, well, then you have really politicized your psyche.

I have long dwelled on the distinction between the right to marriage (which we have) and the benefits accruing from state-sanctioned unions (which, by and large, we lack) because I believe w need, as I expressed in a recent comment, highlight “difference between ‘freedom to’ and ‘state recognition of.’”  The state has long privileged monogamous unions between individual of different sexes–and for good reason.  Such relationships benefit society and protect women.

Unfortunately, with states liberalizing divorce laws, they reduced the benefits of the unions.  If you don’t penalize a spouse for straying, then you don’t discourage behavior which threatens the stability of the marriage (and which particularly hurts children).  Serious advocates of marriage would call for laws which make divorce more difficult and offer severe penalties to an unfaithful spouse.

Unfortunately, the trend seems to be in the opposite direction, with New York set to become the “last state” to “adopt no-fault divorce”.  Now, I’m sure some social conservatives are opposing such legislation.  Those who don’t while continuing to oppose state recognition of same-sex marriage, are just plain not sincere about their support for the institution and the ideals which undergird it.  Indeed, no-fault divorce laws are far more damaging to the institution of marriage than would be state recognition of same-sex marriages. (more…)

And you might know that if you were paying any attention to the jurisdiction you ostensibly represent in Washington.

As California’s Central Valley bears the brunt of Boxer’s environmental policies, with unemployment nearing 40% in some regions, Mrs. Boxer “challenged” her soon-to-be successor “to come with her to Fresno“.  This from an piece defending the three-term incumbent for her record on jobs–as if the only way to create jobs is for the government to do it.

Well, when Mrs. Boxer airdropped into the state’s fifth largest city as part of a 9-city swing (perhaps her first visit of the year?), Carly had already been there nine times this year alone–not to mention her previous visits.  In short, Carly Fiorina has long since met Barbara Boxer’s challenge.

And while Mrs. Boxer’s apologists assume that opponents of government spending schemes are the only way to create jobs (Ma’am, if they’re so successful, how come unemployment has increased since the one such scheme, the “so-called stimulus,” passed?), the president, to whom she serves as a constant apologist “understands deeply that governments don’t create jobs, businesses create jobs.”  At least according to his own Treasury Secretary.

Barbara Boxer and her apologists might be more aware of her opponent’s record on jobs and her travel schedule if only they were paying attention to the campaign.  But, they seem stuck in liberal think, assuming that only those favoring big government programs have plans to get the economy going.

If those big government spending schemes worked, we’d be having boom times –and not record unemployment — here in the (once and future) Golden State.

This Cycle’s Most Vulnerable Longtime House Democrat: John Spratt?

When Jim Geraghty asked a

Republican who’s watching the House races closely . . . whether there were any signs of old-guard House Democrats from deeply conservative, deeply Republican districts getting knocked off this cycle . . . , the one that jumped out most to him was 14-term incumbent John Spratt of South Carolina, who represents an R+7district and who faces a strong challenge from Mick Mulvaney. The GOP challenger released an internal poll showing him trailing by only two percentage points.

Read the whole thing.

Last fall, when Levi Johnston was telling stories which confirmed the prejudices of MSM reporters and editors about Sarah Palin, they ate up his stories, featuring him on cable news programs, inviting him to swank Hollywood parties.  Heck, one left-wing TV hostess even dubbed him a gay icon.

As I wrote back then:

For certain figures in the media clearly delighting in promoting him so as they could better destroy their favorite villain in the post-George W. Bush era, the grandmother of his child.  He took their interest in destroying Palin as a real interest in him and giving a kid from rural Alaska a chance in the big city.

Well, now they don’t seem as interested as they once did. You see, he made it all up:

After surfing the wave of celebrity that was primarily fueled by a willingness to lie about almost everything about Sarah, Todd and Bristol Palin, Levi has finally come clean in the pages of People, admitting; “”I publicly said things about the Palins that were not completely true.”

As the MSM lost interest in him, he surely had an epiphany, realizing that the media were just taking him for a ride to promote their preferred prejudice, you know about Sarah Palin being a rube from the sticks.

I didn’t catch the major news sources devoting as much time to his apology as they did to his fabrications.  Wonder if any of them will engage in soul-searching about their readiness to believe his tales and their rush to give him lots of air time.  Seems they’re only interested in the salacious details of the lives of Republican candidates for Vice President, given that this young man was given far more air time than a certain masseuse from Oregon.

Even before Carly Fiorina has taken to the airwaves to take on the state’s junior Senator, a 28-year veteran of Washington politics, that partisan Democrat has seen her numbers drop in a state Obama carried with 61% of the vote:

California voters are giving U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer some of the lowest approval ratings of her career, as the three-term Democrat is in a statistical dead heat against first-time GOP office-seeker Carly Fiorina, according to a new Field Poll released today. . . .

Boxer’s slight numerical lead masks potentially serious problems for the senator, starting with how 52 percent of the respondents hold an unfavorable view of her.

At the same time, her job approval rating is among the lowest that Field has measured for her since she was first elected to the Senate in 1992: 43 percent of registered voters disapprove of her performance while 42 percent approve. Among likely voters, 48 percent disapprove and 42 percent approve.

Emphasis added.

That’s right, her approval is a full 18 points below Obama’s tally less than two years ago.  And she’s going to have a hard time changing minds.  Having been a fixture in the state’s politics since the dawn of the Clinton era, Mrs. Boxer is a known quantity:  ”the new poll shows that whether voters love or hate her, 93 percent hold an opinion about Boxer.”

And when the campaign heats up and people learn of her record and arrogance in office, expect her unfavorables to increase.

The long and short of it is this:  if the race is about the incumbent, Barbara Boxer loses.

NB:  Edited and expanded.

They accost you when you’re leaving the grocery store when you’re really not in the mood to deal with politics and have, I’m told, accosted citizens minding their own business in other public spaces.  Most seem to be kids in (or just out of) college.  And despite their education, they remain clueless about the meaning of the word, “legal.”

I do believe they mean well, but somehow in coming out of the closet, they join the gay organization on their college campus where they are often taught that activism is part of being gay.  Unless they engage in some kind of political activity (almost always for a left-wing organization like the folks in California laboring for the state Democratic Party front group, “Equality California” (EqCA)), they’re deemed selfish or self-hating.  (Hopefully, more on this expectation of activism in a subsequent post.)

I’m not entirely sure why EqCA has engaged these young folks to press for the legalization of something that is already legal — gay marriage –but they do seem to frequent grocery stores (and shopping malls) frequented by our Angeleno readers.

Now, you may say, as do many of our critics, that, well, didn’t the citizens of California vote to ban gay marriage when they passed Proposition 8?

And I will tell you that in fact they didn’t.  Prop 8 had nothing to do with making gay marriage illegal.  It had everything to do with what type of unions the state recognizes as “marriage.”

Let me build on my answer with a question:   in the 19 months since Prop 8 passed, can you name one person who has been arrested or otherwise punished by authorities from the State of California for getting married? (more…)

Michael Moore has been “elected to the board of governors that oversees the Oscars.”

(H/t: Imdb.)

Guess making a deceptive documentary qualifies one for honors in Hollywood.