Coming to you from beautiful Uptown Houston! Who's ready to talk political lesbians, gay marriage, and how big, bushy mustaches can actually help fight cancer?
When I came to Houstonin the fall of 1985 to go to the University of Houston, Ronald Reagan was in the White House, and had never uttered the word AIDS. I quickly found my way to Houston's Montrose neighborhood and with its cluster of gay bars, coffee shops and restaurants. Houston's first woman elected to city government, Kathy Whitmire, had been in office for three years. As I gay man, I had many wonderful gay, straight & lesbian friends, who were very politically acitve and quickly begin to raise my social & political consciousness. They helped me understand how important/amazing/historic it was to see a woman calling the shots for them "good ole boys" down at City Hall. It was a post-Geraldine Ferraro & pre-Hillary Clinton kind of world.
Houston's 1985 mayoral election, in which Whitmire won reelection over former mayor Louie Welch and supporters of the "straight slate" ticket, attracted national attention. The Montrose area of Houston held the core of Whitmire's political support in the late 1970s and early 1980s. In the 1991 Mayor of Houston election the sole area where the majority of residents voted for Whitmire was Montrose; she took 40% of the vote in Montrose precincts.
The years passed quickly; I finally left Houston in the 1990's and spent 10 + years in California and becoming quickly more politically aware/active/engaged. Cut to my return to Houston in time to witness the historic election of Barack Obama.
Houston had changed of course, and Montrose's quaint neighborhoods and quirky night spots have been gentrified and replaced with $500,000 townhomes & lofts. But some things have got better, (hello Discovery Green!) and now we are on the verge of electing Annise Parker our city's second woman mayor, and our first nation's first lesbian mayor.
City Controller Annise Parker and former City Attorney Gene Locke, the two candidates originally predicted by many to prevail at the race's outset, face each other in a Dec. 12 runoff.
The unpredictable and unorthodox race for Houston mayor narrowed on November 3rd to a choice between a veteran City Hall insider trying to become Houston's first openly gay leader and a former civil rights activist hoping to become only the second African-American to run the nation's fourth-largest city.
The mayor's race has been notable for its civility and lack of focus on Parker's personal life. Annise and her life partner, Kathy Hubbard, have been together since 1990. They have two children.
However, from the early months of this year, Parker and the other candidates focused almost exclusively on issues, policy ideas and endorsements. But many of their prescriptions for fixing the city's problems with crime, transportation and economic development differed only in nuance, leaving voters with little to distinguish one from the other.
I believe Annise Parker has what it takes to lead our city through tough economic times.
A businesswoman and neighborhood leader, Annise has served the people of Houston for the last 11 years – first on the City Council, and for the last five years as City Controller. She spent 20 years in the oil and gas industry before entering public service. Annise has worked closely with Mayor Bill White and many other leaders to keep our city moving forward – with sound economic policy, not divisive politics.
I still can't help but wonder, "Is Houston really ready for an openly lesbian mayor? My favorite shamanic janitor/SF Gate Columnist reminds us
Fear and homophobia, sadness and confusion have come 'round once more, chalked up yet another little victory, this time in the twee state of Maine, where the trees are exceedingly lovely this time of year, the seafood is world-famous and the people are generally warm and nondescript, entirely devoid of major news-making ability, except when the old, scared homophobes among them step out and vote. And then it's boom, hello, world! For about a second.
In sum, Maine voted against allowing two people who love each other very dearly to get married, thus delaying what everyone acknowledges is pretty much a foregone conclusion for a few more years, or at least until most of the bewildered homophobes of the older generations die off, Generation Facebook takes over and we all look back from the globally warmed perspective of 2020 and realize, holy sweet hell, how pathetic was all that gay marriage idiocy way back when?
I realize that Maine is a direct referendum on gay citizens rights, whereas Houston's mayoral contest only has a gay subplot; but it still reminds me that we can't take anything for granted.
Maine voted down gay marriage by three little percentage points, barely a blip that won't last long. Twenty years ago, the point spread would've been far larger. In fact, legal gay marriage was so unthinkable back then that it wouldn't have made it anywhere near a public vote in the first place.
So you merely glance up at Maine and its ilk with a sad sigh, safe in the knowledge that fear and homophobia are just doing their typical, reactionary thing, throwing up an angry little roadblock and trying desperately to slow the progression of the human experiment
And speaking of lesbians, one of my favorite of the lipstick variety, Sandra Bernhard, popped up on HLN's Joy Behar Show talking about Carrie Prejean's Sex Tape & Gay Rights along with fellow comediennes Fran Drescher & Aisha Tyler.
Around 4:42 on Obama & gay marriage
Aisha T: "Obama is our great half-white hope. People want him to do everything and he can't. Liberals and progressives have to be patient...we have two wars and people are going nuts!"
Sandra B: "Ya know what? Weve had to be patient for eight years"
At 8:31 on religious hypocrisy
Joy B: "Why is it the loudest religious people are always the ones breaking the rules? Like Ted Haggard, Carrie Prejean..."
Sandra B: "Because they're full of shame and fear. They're fear based!"
As promised, I present an opportunity for you to help raise awareness & support for men's prostate & testicular cancer. For a complete overview of the Movember Foundation, men's health, their beneficiary partners, research and programs that Movember funds please visit the Movember Foundation Site.
Movember is an annual, month-long celebration of the moustache, highlighting men’s health issues - specifically prostate and testicular cancer.
Watch a short intro to Movember by clicking on the video image below:
If you can, please help by my MoBro by making a small donation here. Tell him Fab 3 sent you!
The Prostate Cancer Foundation has a simple and urgent goal to find better treatments and a cure for prostate cancer by funding promising research programs that otherwise would not be able to find funding.
The Lance Armstrong Foundation unites people to fight all cancers, believing that unity is strength, knowledge is power and attitude is everything.