by Brian Leubitz [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

In a letter to the Alice B. Toklas LGBT Democratic Club, Sen. Barack Obama stated his opposition to the California constitutional amendment. As far as I know, this is the first official mention of such a position.

Incidentally, the Alice Pride Breakfast was an amazing success. I'll have pictures up from the Alice Breakfast and Leno Pride 2008 up soon.

Check the letter out over the flip...

by Be_Devine [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

Mark Leno finished the night with an incredibly strong showing.  With 100% of the precincts now reporting, Mark Leno won the election with 43 percent of the vote.  Joe Nation had 29 percent and the incumbent, Carole Migden, had 27 percent.

Congratulations, Mark, on a campaign that was both well fought and very well received.

At his victory party last night, Mark Leno spoke directly to the divide that this primary contest has created in the progressive community and in the LGBT community.  He called on all of us to put this primary behind us and come together in unity to begin to fight the heinous anti-marriage initiative that is on the ballot in November.  And he is right.  If we (meaning both Mark's supporters and Carole's supporters) can keep the momentum and harness the passion that has been poured into this race from both sides and apply that to fighting this discriminatory initiative, we will certainly prevail in November.  

I hope Senator Migden joins Mark's call for uniting together as a community for this important goal.

by Brian Leubitz [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

I'm about to head out to some polling places to see how the turnout is, and generally poke around. But, there are some issues that I wanted to raise:

by Brian Leubitz [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

Remember Leslie Southwick? Well, in case you forgot, he's the guy who wrote that children should be removed from gay parents. Oh, and W appointed to him to be a federal judge. Yup, that guy. If you recall, DiFi is basically the only reason his nomination got past the judiciary committee. She broke ranks with the other Dems and voted in support of the nominations with her conservative bretheren in the Republican party. Yay DiFi, thanks for tossing the LGBT community under the bus again. You really have a knack for it.

Well, once you recall all of that, the other important news is that the nomination is coming up for a floor vote very soon. And our old pal DiFi is going around telling other Senators that she's getting no negative comments about Leslie Southwick at ALL! Everybody loves Leslie! Except, that's not really the case. Her own staffers, and other senators, seem to be surprised given the news from the real world that she's getting lots of mail about this. 

The good folks at FireDogLake, have some ideas on what to do. Namely, make sure that DiFi hears a loud and clear message that this vote stunk then, and it stinks now.  Oh, and there will be a presser next Tuesday. I'll try to be there. Mailing info blatantly ripped off from FDL over the flip.