The public has a right to know...

...who's signing the anti-gay marriage petition in Massachusetts. So, combining good citizenship with HTML, a Massaachusetts couple has established a web site to publicize the names of petitioners.

From the group's mission statement:

KnowThyNeighbor.org is a grassroots, non-profit organization dedicated to removing barriers to public information by making it available online. If it's public information, it should be simple for a member of the public to access it!

Initiative Petition # 05-02, The Constitutional Amendment to Define Marriage, represents a public political effort that could negatively affect the lives of many families, individuals, and children within the Commonwealth. By posting the names and addresses of the 65,825+ signers, KnowThyNeighbor.org is supporting the Democratic Process by providing the public with direct access to information that they are entitled to see and that is relevant to this controversial topic.

KnowThyNeighbor.org believes that the general public has the right to easy access of such information and makes no assertion as to how this information should be used by the public. This being said, the founders of KnowThyNeighbor.org, its support staff, and volunteers believe in equal marriage protection for all Massachusetts families an hope to encourage Civil and Legal Discourse on the topic.

Will it intimidate some people? No, I think it will shame them - as it should.

"There were no earthquakes."

Two key Massachusetts legislators have dropped their support for the anti-gay marriage constitutional amendment. Their rationale? The Commonwealth has had gay marriage in place for more than a year, and they see no evidence of any negative effects.

Hey, Karl Rove - are you listening?

How long until we hear this spin from 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.?

How bad is the water in New Orleans?

This bad. According to analysis done for Good Morning America, total sewage bacteria in a water sample from New Orleans is 45,000 times what would be considered safe for swimming in a pond or a lake.
One report says it could "take years to fullly restore clean drinking water."

The truth begins to trickle out from the Big Easy

GayPatriot exposes the corrupt politics (big surprise!) at the heart of the crisis in NOLA. This report comes from the Washington Post - not some right-wing blog. Will the rest of the MSM follow-up on this?

AFP Apologizes, sort of

According to Yahoo! the press agency AFP has thought better of it and withdrawn its photo and caption that sparked the outrage about racism re: the looting in New Orleans.

We need competent leadership!

Andrew Sullivan endorses Rudy in 2008. Amen.

Speaking truth to power (again) in the South

As with his Tsunami reporting, Anderson Cooper has distinguished himself by his humanity as well as his keen observation skills. The journalists and technicians down in the affected areas are enduring hardships, no doubt. But Cooper in the Gulf Coast, along with FOX News' Shepard Smith in New Orleans, are leading the pack with ther gritty, no-punches-pulled descriptions of the devstation.

LGBT group supports disaster relief

HURRICANE KATRINA RELIEF FUND

Please be part of the LGBT community's response to the loss and devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina.

Hurricane Katrina has blazed a trail of destruction throughout Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. Thousands of homes have been destoyed and several hundred lives have been lost. Many of the survivors are homeless and in need of food, safe drinking water, and medical care. It is estimated that tens of thousands will need temorary housing for months to come. RWF has established a fund for donations to help the survivors of Katrina. We are responding with food aid -- donations through RWF will go to our partner America's Second Harvest (ASH), the nation's food bank network. ASH is one of the most effective charities in the world. ASH expects that at least ten food banks and hundreds of related agencies were hit by Hurricane Katrina. Your donations will be used to provide meals and groceries, transport food to survivors, and secure additional warehouse space to assist food banks in resuming and maintaining operations. 100% of the funds you donate to the RWF Hurricane Katrina Relief Fund will go toward helping the survivors recover.

Donate at: http://www.rainbowfund.org/donate specify "Katrina" or send a check to "Rainbow World Fund", PO Box 14480, San Francisco, CA 94114.

Please help spread the word and forward this email to your friends and families.

Beyond the pale....

Just when you think the Left couldn't possibly shock with its tendency toward shrill, misleading, and disingenuous commentary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. steps up to prove us wrong. While the scientificevidence linking global warming and hurricanes in general is weak, was Mississippi's governor SO influencing regarding the Kyoto treaty on global warming? Had the U.S. signed on to the treaty, would Katrina not heaped its devastation on the Gulf Coast? Shame on him.

OK - Which is it?

Given my new obsession with the Tablet PC (including my own, which arrived on Monday - about which more later...), I'd like to know: is its adoptation rate growing or slowing?

Summer reading list

In addition to the latest Harry Potter, I've been reading The Tricky Part : One Boy's Fall from Trespass into Grace. It's actor Martin Moran's memoir of growing up Catholic, gay, and the victim of a pederast (though not a priestly one). Victim is my word; I'm half-way through, and I'm not sure if he ever sees himself as one. He credits his violator for introducing himself to himself (i.e. discovering and acting on his homosexuality), which is an astonishing act of forgiveness. I've seen Moran on stage only once, as the telegraph operator in Titanic. He memorably sang "The Night Was Alive," a similar tale of self-discovery, this time recounting how a lonely boy discovered Marconi's machine - and a way of connecting with "a thousand voices fighting to be heard."