From the ‘We’re Having Difficulty Working Up Any Sympathy’ file, the Chicago Sun-Times (10/17) reports that, even though the Boy Scouts of America won a Supreme Court ruling six years ago that they could ban gay leaders, they keep losing local legal battles over the same issue: Berkeley, Calif., says the Scouts can’t use a public marina for free; Connecticut won’t let donations to the Scouts be taken out of a payroll deduction plan; and Philadelphia is threatening to evict a Boy Scout Council from its publically-owned headquarters. In a change of pace, two federal judges have ruled that government aid to the Scouts is unconstitutional because their members are required to swear an oath of duty to God.
The late Gerry Studds, the first openly gay member of Congress, was legally married to his partner, Dean Hara. Both were from Massachusetts, where same-sex marriage is legal. Hara, Studds’ husband, is not entitled to Studds’ pension because of the ’96 Defense of Marriage Act, which doesn’t recognize same-sex marriage. The Chicago Sun-Times (10/18) goes on to point out the other two reasons for denying pensions: espionage and treason.
Frank Rich, in The New York Times (10/15), comments (partly) on the ‘Turn the Page’ Foley scandal talks of ‘The Gay Old Party Comes Out.’ Rich also mentions Condi Rice swearing in the new (gay) global AIDS coordinator, Mark Dybul. The Sec of State referred to Dybul’s partner’s mother as his ‘mother-in-law.’ The article moves on to (gay) Steve Herbits, Donald Rumsfeld’s right-hand consultant, and then to the homophobic Karl Rove, whose beloved adoptive father, Louis, was gay. Kirk Fordham (gay), who exposed Foley and worked for several other homophobic senators, trotted in. Vile Senator Rick Santorum (whose name has an entirely different meaning now, thanks to columnist Dan Savage) employed a gay director of communications. Rich goes on to say that ‘… gay people did not ‘infiltrate’ the party apparatus—they are the party apparatus.’
From the ‘Stuck In, Around or Through You’ file, the Chicago Sun-Times (10/19) warns that various body piercings that ‘… began among gay men in the late 1970s [and] spread to lesbians and punk rockers’ are running into problems such as ‘… allergic reactions, infection and scar tissue… frictional irritation,… interruption of urine flow and a persistant erection.’ The TV show Grey’s Anatomy has had a show involving two friends who are stuck together by body jewelry. Talk about hooking up with someone!