Sunday, 6 October 2013 – 5:19 PM
| Comments Off on A long-overdue Bent Alaska update — October 2013
Bent Alaska’s blog will continue in hiatus indefinitely; but the Bent Alaska Facebook Group on Facebook is thriving — join us! A long-overdue update from Bent Alaska’s editor.
Wednesday, 3 November 2010 – 1:20 PM
| Comments Off on The election is finally over. Well, not quite.
The election is finally over. Or… not quite. With 432 out of 438 precincts reporting, the front-runner in the hotly contested U.S. Senate race is “Write-in Votes” with 41.0% of the vote — nearly 7 points ahead of Tea Party-leaning Republican candidate Joe Miller (34.2%). Democratic candidate Scott McAdams, who consistently polled with the best “favorables” — i.e., people liked him better than either Murkowski or Miller — nonetheless drew only 23.74% of the vote counted so far.
Monday, 1 November 2010 – 8:16 PM
| Comments Off on VOTE
A message from Alaskans Together:
Tuesday is Election Day! Please remember to vote.
There are a number of high stake races from Supreme Court Justices to the U.S. Senate race which could be determined by a few hundred votes. It’s important that the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community come out and vote during this very important election and help support pro-equality candidates.
We need strong supportive voices for equality at all levels of government.
We encourage you to get informed and learn about each and every candidate and ballot measure before heading to the polls.
Election Day – Polls are open from 7:00 a.m. – 8:00 p.m.
Not sure where to vote? Just text “where” to 30644, then enter your complete address and you will get a text with your polling location information. You can also visit the state division of election website.
Alaskans Together for Equality Inc. is a nonpartisan organization that neither supports nor opposes any political party or candidate for office.
Sunday, 31 October 2010 – 1:02 PM
| Comments Off on Miller, Moffitt and Phelps – Oh, my!
Tea Party candidate Joe Miller was born and raised in Kansas, stayed there after high school and met his wife there. She was also raised in Kansas. Later, he attended Yale and moved to Alaska, but his world view comes from Kansas.
When I heard about Miller’s background, my first thought was, “Let’s click our heels 3 times and send him home!”
My second thought: “I wonder if he knows the Westboro clowns?”
Just because he grew up in Kansas doesn’t mean he was influenced by the Kansas “GodHatesFags” Phelps family clan, does it? No, you can’t taint a whole state because of the antics of one crazy, media-obsessed family. Alaskans know that from painful experience.
I didn’t think much of Miller and the Kansas connection until I read the Mother Jones report saying that he hired a political consultant who runs a pray-away-the-gay project… AND a hate group that thinks God will punish America for allowing gay people to be gay.
Well, heck, that sounds familiar!
Could Miller be connected to Westboro?
“We’ve got deep, deep roots in Kansas – multi-generations,” Miller said.
Miller’s parents, Rex and Sharry Miller, live in Manhattan [Kansas], where Rex used to own Christian Books & Gifts.
Manhattan, Kansas is just a few miles down the road from west Topeka, the home base of Fred Phelps’ Westboro clan. It’s a good bet that a radical Christian activist would check out the local Christian bookstores and get to know their owners.
Miller was raised in Salina and stationed at Fort Riley. His wife grew up in Junction City. These towns are just down Highway 70 from the Westboro compound.
Joe “deep roots in Kansas” Miller is now running for US Senate in Alaska. He won the GOP primary with the paid help of consultant Terry Moffitt, an extreme anti-gay activist with a goal very much like the Westboro hate group.
Moffitt is the chairman of the Family Policy Network, a group that passionately opposes homosexuality.
Moffitt’s Family Policy Network runs a project called “Hope for Homosexuals” that encourages “practicing homosexuals to ‘come out’ of that destructive lifestyle, and to ‘come home’ to the love and forgiveness of Jesus Christ… While the homosexuals celebrate their perversions, they are confronted with the truth that there is hope for deliverance in Jesus Christ.” In June, the group hired an airplane to fly a banner near Disney World during a gay outreach day that read “Jesus Christ: WWW.HOPEFORHOMOSEXUALS.COM.” It has flown this banner in other spots where there might be a collection of gays and lesbians…
The group’s guiding principles, according to its website, include opposition to all fornication and homosexuality. It denounces “any efforts to convince society that homosexual behavior or ‘being gay’ is somehow normal or natural.” The organization explains its antipathy to homosexuality “is the result of a healthy fear of God’s judgment that will otherwise be wrought on individuals who reject God’s laws and our our nation for turning a blind eye.” That puts the Family Policy Network in the extreme camp of anti-gay activists—those who believe that God could punish the United States collectively, if Americans tolerate homosexuality. (This is reminiscent of when Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson partly blamed gay rights activists for the 9/11 attack.)
Rachel Maddow covered the Miller/Moffitt story on her show before she came to Alaska. It’s the reason she was determined to interview Joe, even if she had to come all the way to Alaska and follow him around for two days until he spoke to her. Here’s her original story on Miller & Moffitt:
When she was in Alaska, Maddow asked Miller about gays being cured. He said it’s a state issue. (His absurd response is posted HERE.) So each state can decide whether or not the gay people living there can – or must – be “cured” by the dangerous and ineffective methods pushed by Moffitt.
As for Joe Miller: He isn’t in Kansas any more, and it’s up to the voters of Alaska to click our heels down to the voting booths and send him home!
Friday, 29 October 2010 – 10:35 AM
| Comments Off on McAdams to LGBT Alaska: Full Equality
Last night, the Grrlzlist, a weekly e-newsletter for the Alaska women’s community, published a special letter from Scott McAdams to the LGBT community, and this morning Bent Alaska received the link to a longer PDF version of the letter uploaded on the McAdams site:
Dear friends,
I wanted to take a moment to share with you my position on issues of importance to the LGBT community.
All Americans should have the same rights regardless of sexual orientation, and as Alaska’s next U.S. Senator, I am committed to standing up for members of the LGBT community.
I strongly believe liberty begins with the individual, from a woman’s right to choose to a persons’ right to marry their significant other regardless of sexual orientation. I believe the government has no place telling people whom they can and cannot love.
I’m also the only candidate in this race that supports the full repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. Sexual orientation should not deprive anyone of the opportunity to proudly serve our country. Like many Alaskans, I am disappointed by Lisa’s weak record when it comes to standing up for equality for all Alaskans.
While Lisa says we need her seniority in the Senate, in 2010, she used her seat on the Appropriations Committee to vote with her party against every appropriations bill. Lisa voted against over $400 million in funding for critical Alaska projects and programs, including domestic violence and sexual assault prevention funding. Seniority doesn’t mean much if you put your party ahead of the interests of Alaska.
I’m also happy to report we’ve got great “McMentum.” The most recent polling is showing this race as a dead heat between Lisa and me, with Joe dropping back into third. The polling has also shown movement towards our campaign and away from Joe and Lisa among women in Anchorage. I promise if Alaskans vote their values and not their fears on Election Day, you’ll send someone who represents your interests to the U.S. Senate.
I would be proud to have your support on November 2, 2010.
Voters received a flyer today from the anti-gay Alaska Family Action with a last minute attack against state Supreme Court Justice Dana Fabe, because she agreed with the majority on several abortion and gay rights decisions that went against the agenda of the far right. Claire Rosston, an Anchorage attorney, wrote to Bent Alaska about the attack on Justice Fabe:
I am writing to bring to your attention an issue of concern to your readers. Outside special interests have launched an unfair last-minute attack on Justice Dana Fabe in an effort to try to control Alaska’s judiciary. Today, voters across Alaska received a mailer campaigning against the retention of Justice Fabe. One of the many misleading statements made in the mailer is that Justice Fabe ordered “taxpayer subsidies for same-sex partners.” In fact, Justice Fabe joined the unanimous decision of ACLU v. State, which ruled that government employees are entitled to equal compensation and benefits regardless of their sexual preference. As a result of this decision, workers who are employed by the state or a municipality and who are in committed relationships with a same sex domestic partner are eligible to receive the same employment benefits for their domestic partners that a married employee receives for a spouse.
Justice Fabe currently chairs the Alaska Supreme Court’s Fairness, Diversity and Equality Committee, which seeks to ensure that the promise of “justice for all” is a reality for all Alaskans.
The attack on Justice Fabe is led by Alaska Family Action, Inc., whose top contributor is Citizen Link, a Colorado-based “family advocacy” organization. Another organization that has been identified as a top contributor is the American Family Association, a Mississippi-based “pro-family” organization. Alaska Family Action launched its attack just two weeks before the election–no doubt designed to ensure that Justice Fabe has little time to respond or correct the record.
Citizen Link is the activist arm of Focus on the Family. Likewise, Alaska Family Action is the activist arm of the Alaska Family Council, both run by Jim Minnery whose cousin Tom Minnery is senior vice president of Focus on the Family, a top outside contributor to the Alaska anti-gay lobby.
An editorial spat has broken out in the pages of the Anchorage and Fairbanks newspapers about Justice Fabe and the importance of a non-partisan judiciary. Alex Bryner, a former state supreme court justice, summed up the issue:
They do not attack her for doing her job poorly; they attack her for disobeying their particular agenda… Alaska’s voters must resist this threat by casting informed votes based on the merits of Justice Fabe’s history of judicial performance, not on her willingness to obey pressures exerted by vested interests funded outside Alaska.
Rachel Maddow broadcast her show live from Anchorage on Tuesday night, after interviewing our U.S. Senate candidates and their supporters. Well, she interviewed Democrat Scott McAdams and write-in Lisa Murkowski, and finally got Tea Party Joe Miller to answer a few questions while walking through a building.
At one point she asked Miller, “Do you agree that homosexuality can be cured?” and he responded “it’s a state issue.” (Huh?) When she asked if he thinks being gay is a choice, he began part of his answer by saying “I wanna be straight with you.” (I guess he doesn’t know that she’s a lesbian.) Later in the interview, she corners him on the federal marriage ban, which he supports despite the fact that he thinks it’s a state issue. (Gotcha.)
Watch the Miller “interview” here:
The other segment that covered LGBT issues in Alaska was her candid talk with Tank Jones, bodyguard for Levi Johnston and tour guide for Rachel. At one point she asked if people here are conservative on social issues and are anti-gay, and he gave an interesting response:
No. Not here because we have… 3-4 gay bars here in this small town of Anchorage, and probably over half of the people that’s in these campaigns are secretly gay but they won’t come out. So we don’t really have a anti-gay movement here like they have in other places because… diversity runs big here, very very big here, so we don’t have that problem.
Well, there wouldn’t be so many people afraid to come out if they felt accepted by the community, and we obviously do have that problem here. We also have an anti-gay movement. On the positive side, his answer is the only comment on the show about gay life in Anchorage, and it completely denies the existence of the anti-gays. Anyone who disses the local bigots is OK by me.
Watch the Tank segment:
The best part of the evening was Rachel’s interview of Vic Fisher, a delegate to the convention that wrote the Alaska state constitution, and radio host Shannyn Moore. Vic points out that a constitution is designed to be a living framework, not a static document, and asks us to vote our values, not our fears. Shannyn notes that this election is part of an on-going feud between the Murkowski family and the Palin family. They both explain why we need to support and vote for Scott McAdams.
Watch the Vic and Shannon segment:
The other Alaska segments can be viewed on The Rachel Maddow Show and include interviews with Scott and Lisa and their supporters, and a great segment with ignorant Joe supporters. Between the taped sections, Rachel reported live from the Taproot Cafe in Anchorage. (Guess which bloggers can be seen behind Rachel?)
Thanks to Rachel and her crew for reporting from Alaska, and thanks to Shannyn Moore, Taproot and everyone who encouraged Rachel to visit. She rocks!
Tuesday, 26 October 2010 – 12:45 PM
| Comments Off on AFL-CIO: It Gets Better
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka speaks out against discrimination in the workplace and in support of the It Gets Better Project. He connects anti-gay school bullying to job discrimination, and encourages us to Make It Better by standing together for fairness and equality. (For a local example of this message, the Alaska AFL-CIO is working to unseat anti-worker & anti-gay Rep. Kelly.)
– a guest post by Abel Spark (not his real name), a member of our community in Anchorage, Alaska.
In case you haven’t noticed, there is an election happening. The polls are open today and people are deciding who is most fit to represent Alaska in the US Senate. We have three choices this year. Well, really two. And for me, making this decision has required a great deal of emotional evaluation to determine who I will support.
I don’t count Joe Miller a candidate. He is a palinesque joke and a thug.
This leaves Lisa Murkowski and Scott McAdams as the viable options. Being one who waits until he has as many facts as possible before making an informed decision, I really benefitted from the opportunity to listen, watch, and interact with them both at the same time.
He is well spoken, affable, and funny. She is smart and she is so kind. Really kind. She is no more a monster for being Republican than I am evil for being gay. And I challenge you to find any Alaskan who loves Alaska more. So this year’s ballot has been a really difficult decision for me.
Lisa Murkowski is running on the proof of the record, while Scott McAdams is running on the promise of the future.
Joe Miller is an epic failure.
Lisa’s best argument, and it is a good one, is that Alaska will become powerless, having the delegation with the least seniority in the Senate, a body in which seniority is everything. McAdams’ argument is that he is not beholden to corporate interests and is best positioned to beat Joe Miller because his name is on the ballot. When Scott McAdams promises not to take corporate contributions I hear echoes of George Bush saying “read my lips.” But I try never fault a person for optimism.
Joe Miller’s best argument is that the Koch brothers thinly veiled as a populist movement want more control of the Senate.
Joe Miller? Lisa Murkowski? Scott McAdams? Yikes. This stuff is scary.
The America I was raised in told me that we are all due equal protection under the law. The America I was raised in showed me this is not the case. The Pharisees of today are leading a jihad against the LGBT community. They are making life so unbearable that young people are choosing to kill themselves rather than face the brutal reality of our culture. It has to stop. We must stop it. So which candidate is best prepared to join this fight?
On this point many votes will turn.
Joe, you are as bigoted an individual as they come. Your self-righteousness will prove its own reward.
Lisa, your record on LGBT issues reflects alignment with the forces that have allowed systematic demoralization of millions of Americans. You have disavowed the quote by the Lizard King Jerry Prevo that it is impossible to be gay and Christian. But last week you supplicated at his altar of bigotry. You have voted consistently against the LGBT community and in your response to their survey this summer, you promised nothing will change. It has been painful. You had many chances to help in the struggle. But you didn’t. Here is what you told the Alaska Family Council; the Alaska version of Focus On The Family, a religious group with the blood of LGBT youth on its hands:
Scott, you have obviously not spent too much time contemplating the day to day reality of LGBT existence, but it is clear you understand the underlying issues. You unequivocally stated you support equality, that every citizen is sovereign, that no laws should be passed that create inequality in our system, and that we must do away with those that already do. I try never to fault a man for being an idealist.
I have a handful of LGBT friends who will disagree with me. There is only one genuine choice on this ballot for LGBT voters: Scott McAdams.
To those of you fearing change, I offer this. A long overdue generational shift is under way. An emerging generation of leaders now assumes its rightful place at the table. We are up to the challenges of the future with the same energy and acumen as those who crafted our state and those who have lived here for untold generations.
And to those who claim that Lisa and seniority are the only answer to the problems we now face, and that we are going to be the weakest Senate Delegation because our senior Senator will have only two years of seniority, I have a different perspective to offer.
When Scott McAdams is elected to the US Senate, Alaska might have the least seniority of any State delegation. But it will also be the youngest. In a body where seniority matters, perhaps Alaska is embarking on the first steps of a long journey.
Now for a little history lesson. The youngest and least senior delegation in Alaska history began on December 24, 1968. On January 3, 1969, Alaska enjoyed 11 days of seniority in the US Senate. Look at what Ted Stevens built: the most prosperous era of Alaskan history. Perhaps past is prologue.
Monday, 25 October 2010 – 3:32 PM
| Comments Off on Measure 1: Redistricting is an LGBT Alaskan issue
– a guest post by Maxine Doogan on Ballot Measure 1: a Constitutional Amendment to Increase the Number of Alaska State Legislators and Districts
Redistricting is the process of redrawing congressional and legislative district boundaries to reflect population changes based on the 2010 census information gathered every 10 years. This state constitutional amendment would expand the current State House Representatives from 40 to 44 and the State Senate from 20 to 22. When redistricting is done correctly, it should maximize the impact of one person, one vote. Redistricting is done to make sure no district is larger by population than another. It also groups people with common interest such as belonging to a rural or economic area and is critical in determining the makeup of the governing bodies. Representatives have to make sure that all parts of their district’s needs are being served. And the degree of support and opposition to LGBT related legislation could be determined by the redrawing of district line.
One of the concerns for passing this ballot measure is recognizing the difference in population from the bush communities to the larger cities and assuring rural community members continue to get enough representation. If this ballot measure doesn’t pass, resources to serve the current population could be spread too thin. If this ballot measure does pass there will be costs incurred for the additional staff, offices and travel. However, we generally don’t put a price tag on democratizing representation.
Making sure the redistricting process is democratic is important. This constitutional amendment was put before the voters by bipartisan support and opposed primarily by Republicans. It is our responsibility as part of the LGBT community to ensure the passing of redistricting legislation, as it effects our population and will ensure the voices of all LGBT people get heard. We must ALL turn out our vote and cast our ballots for governor and legislators who support the LGBT community. In doing so, we will decide whether Democrats or Republicans will dominate the State governing bodies and therefore have a say in the redrawing of state and federal political borders for the new decade.
With fair-minded voters voting for fair minded candidates, extremists cannot lock-up or lock-out certain interests for the next decade. Measure 1 needs our immediate response and support to ensure our voice gets heard now and for years to come. If this legislation is blocked by extremists, it will not be good for the LGBT community and the effects will be felt for the next decade. If this constitutional amendment passes, there will be more representation that reflects our best interests and Democrats have traditionally shown the LGBT community that they take our concerns seriously when we care enough to show up at the polls and tell them so.
Early voting and In-Person Absentee Voting is available now. Don’t wait till the last minute.
The very real consequences of DADT repeal; seeking survivor benefits for same-sex partner of Alaska shooting victim; waiting on SCOTUS decision about whether it will hear Prop 8 case; and other recent LGBTQ news selected by Sara Boesser in Juneau, Alaska.
In this month’s “Ask Lambda Legal” column, Lambda Legal answers a question about the federal government’s longstanding ban against donations of blood from men who have sex with men (MSM).
Alaska Pride Conference 2012 kicks off on October 5 with a First Friday showing at Tref.Punkt Studio of Love is Love, a photographic exhibit of LGBT couples from across the state.
United for marriage: Light the way to justice. The U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments this Tuesday and Wednesday, March 26–27, in two cases about freedom to marry. Please join us on Tuesday, March 26, at the federal courthouse in Anchorage (7th & C) in a circle united for equality.
Pariah, a critically acclaimed film about a 17-year-old African-American woman embracing her lesbian identity, will screen at UAA on Friday, November 2, and will be followed by a discussion on acceptance in honor of Mya Dale. The event is free and open to the public.
