When you blog, and have a reputation as a blogger, after a while, you find yourself subscribed to every damned email list on the planet. And that's fine, because god made spam filters for a reason: to bleep out all the self-serving bullshit from every possible interest convinced that their issue is the be-all and end-all of life as we know it. That and the emails about p3nis 3nlargement, of course.

It takes effort to cut through the clutter. Here is one ad that, hands-down, makes the cut.

FCKH8.com Straight Talk About Gay Marriage from FCKH8.com on Vimeo.

I don't know about you, but I want that t-shirt.

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn has wielded enormous power.

Council Member Gale Brewer has submitted Intro 97, a bill to mandate paid sick leave for people who work in NYC. Today, Speaker Quinn told Brewer that she is halting progress on this bill. Right now, there are 35 sponsors of the bill, enough to override Mayor Bloomberg's veto, should he choose to use it. But apparently it isn't enough to override Speaker Quinn's veto.

I'm not commenting on the merits of the bill. My comment is on the de facto power that one person -- the City Council Speaker -- has to decide what legislation moves forward and what legislation does not. Things in Albany, with its "three men in a room" setup, are dysfunctional enough. But one man, or woman, deciding things? It's un-American!

The dysfunction is Albany has been getting a lot of press, but don't let that fool you; things in NYC are just as bad. There is no real debate on the budget, because the Mayor decides almost all of it. There is no real debate on legislation, because the Speaker decides that. There is no real debate on land use questions either, because almost every step of the process is either "advisory" (meaning that group has no power) or a rubber-stamp. Even the city has its share of opaque "public" authorities, such as the EDC, that deal with huge amounts of money, wield enormous power, and are not answerable to the people.

We need real reform in NYC. We can complain all we want about Washington and Albany, but change begins at home.

From now until election day you can spend a weekend making history. This election will decide whether we can continue to rebuild America and effect progressive change or if Republicans will force us backed to failed Bush policies. You can help beat back two Bush Republicans, one in NY State and one in Pennsylvania.

This comes from Act Now:

...join ACT NOW as we team up with Organizing for America and other progressive organizations to go door-to-door on behalf of Congressman John Hall.

RSVP for our Saturday and Sunday canvasses

John Hall represents a historically conservative district, but has been a strong progressive vote in Congress, supporting health care reform, financial reform, and the stimulus package. His opponent, Republican Nan Hayworth, is a self-avowed Reaganite, who believes that the way to prosperity is a freeze on all non-military discretionary spending, a freeze on stimulus spending, and repealing health care reform.  read more »

Free At Last?

A federal judge issued a worldwide injunction Tuesday stopping enforcement of the "don't ask, don't tell" policy, ending the military's 17-year-old ban on openly gay troops.

U.S. District Judge Virginia Phillips' landmark ruling was widely cheered by gay rights organizations that credited her with getting accomplished what President Obama and Washington politics could not.

"This order from Judge Phillips is another historic and courageous step in the right direction, a step that Congress has been noticeably slow in taking," said Alexander Nicholson, executive director of Servicemembers United, the nation's largest organization of gay and lesbian troops and veterans.

DOJ is likely to appeal the ruling, but today, for the first time in the history of the Republic, gay and lesbian Americans can serve the flag like all other Americans, with honesty and without fear.

Whatever comes next, that's worth celebrating.

As a political-commentator, it is never advisable to make predictions that can be seen as “out on a limb”, but many of us do it anyway. The fact is that even a supposedly safe prediction can backfire and undermine one's credibility in just a single special-election, far more a whole national election-cycle. It's probably always better to couch your predictions a bit: a lesson I learned again recently.

You see, a few months ago I appeared on a BCAT cable-television program in Brooklyn, with Tom Robbins (staff writer/ The New York Village Voice) and Tom Tracey (The Brooklyn Paper). We were discussing the then upcoming primary elections. I am sure one can “Google” and find the show on the Internet. In that discussion I told the viewing audience that Carl Paladino was going nowhere fast. I essentially felt back then -and still do now- that he is totally unfit to be the governor of New York State. I thought Rick Lazio was going to clean his clock in the Republican primary: boy, was I wrong!  read more »