Today's Podcast: The Filibuster and National Snooze Button

Good, informative stuff on today's filibuster. We talk about the rules and how it works, and why some of the things have gone the way they've gone. It serves equal parts filibuster 101 and advocacy for its reform of repeal. Both Mike and I would love to see the thing go, but even making people stand up and defend their stance for hours -- instead of the current means of allowing things to take place behind closed doors -- would be a big improvement.

Click here to listen, or use the blog talk radio widget to the right.

Capuano Coming to LeftAhead.com

Mike, Lynne and I will be hosting Senate candidate and current U.S. Representative Mike Capuano on our LeftAhead podcast next week. The likely date is on Tuesday, though not at the regular time -- the show is more likely to start around 6pm. Check out LeftAhead.com over the next few days for the upcoming details -- and kudos to Mike for lining Capuano up.

Note to Politicians: Bring Ideas to the Table

Politicians and wannabees hopefuls need to realize that you can't just talk to bloggers and expect glowing praise for giving us attention. You've got to deliver us the goods -- and by goods, I mean actual ideas with some beef behind them.

There are few things better for a blogger than hearing real, reality-based policy ideas coming from politicians. It makes our day. Mike, Lynne and I get a lot of that over at LeftAhead, whether it was with Jen Benson, Sonia Chang-Diaz, Boston City Councilor John Tobin or any of the literally dozens of candidates we've had on for State Representative, Senate and Mayoral races. All of them brought ideas forward, backed up with hard facts. We don't always agree with every single policy point, but we appreciate the fact that these ideas are usually made with great care and precision.

Mike didn't get many ideas and policy points with city council hopeful Ayanna Pressley at a recent breakfast he went to (and I skipped). Consequently, he spoke the truth about his meeting with Pressley at his blog. Pressley was vague. I don't know if she expected a glowing report, but the most important thing in any campaign is time -- and she clearly tried engaging the blogosphere in this race as time she thought worth spending. I'm glad she did give bloggers that time - I hope she'll continue going forward - but without ideas, opinions and at least some substance, it's a useless endeavor. Unfortunately, more often than not, the takeaway politicians usually make in this regard is to despise spend less time with bloggers. In reality, the real lesson to learn is to bring more ideas for constituents to the table: that's how to get a blogger's glowing report as well as win an individual vote.

Mike referenced Deval Patrick at his blog -- and how being vague was good for the Governor at a statewide level, even if it's not good at a city level. I disagree: broad strokes and inspiration can win a City Council seat just as easily as it can the Corner Office. However, what made Deval Patrick's broad stumps effective was that they were balanced by the fact that no one had more concrete policy percolating than Deval Patrick -- be it through his website or frequent pressers. He may have spoke in the big picture, but he always backed that up with real ideas for the wonks and political junkies among us, ideas that trickled down the water cooler and caught on as his campaign did. Even for those who weren't interested in the minutiea of Patrick's every campaign policy stance, they knew he had a lot of them. The same can be said of an even better politician, President Obama.

If people want to run "big picture" campaigns, they need to back up that big picture with concrete ideas at their website and when pressed by media, including the blogosphere. While no one wants a 30 minute stump speech bore at a neighborhood coffee hour, they do want a specific, detailed answer to a personally important question -- and if a city council candidate can't do that, they're not going to get onto the City Council.

Go Read Mike

As usual, Mike's been kicking butt on the marriage-equality issue. His posts on what's happnin in Maine shouldn't be missed. Here's his latest.

Mostly what she shares with the Mass. Family Institute, no longer the Christian Civic League of Maine, and MassResistance sorts is the Whac-A-Mole behavior. Typically, this might involve:

• Lobby and advertise to influence the legislature.
• If the lawmakers pass gay rights or SSM, turn to the courts or a referendum.
• If the courts mandate gay rights or SSM, turn to the legislature or a referendum.

Just as they seem devoid of compassion and humanity and fairness, there is no such thing as taking a loss. If they win at the court level, its self-righteous calls of the rule of law. If they lose at the court level, it's activist judges legislating from the bench. If they win in the legislature, it is democracy proving their point. If they lose in the legislature, it is liberal agenda thwarting the will of the people. If they lose in multiple venues, it's a Prop. 8 call for a ballot initiative.

He also looks at the process of the so-called "people's veto" law in Maine and the various possibilities that exist.

Am I Watching the GLBT Community Implode Over ENDA?

As my co-host on LeftAhead, Mike, mentions, Barney Frank won't unite GENDA and ENDA. According to Frank, two bills offers glb people a real chance at legislative victory that would provide protections from discrimination at the work place. Bay Windows has more on the vote counts, but if Frank is to be believed, ENDA alone would pass by 15-20 votes, while an inclusive ENDA/GENDA wouldn't pass at all - in fact, it would be "vulnerable to anti-trans amendments from Republicans." Of course, this was the major topic on our most recent LeftAhead internet radio show. Mike, Lynne and Laurel thought Frank was making a mistake, as do most glbt organizations and usually even myself. Sometimes, though, I think Frank truly understands how politics - especially civil rights - works: incrementally. ENDA is obviously a very complicated and touchy issue. In fact, the more I think about it, the more I think everyone's right and everyone's wrong. As I've said over and over again, Blogger.com just doesn't come with a crystal ball button to predict the future (maybe in the next beta?).

However, here's what I do know: it's wrong to belittle or attack people in the community for speaking out as John Avarosis has done. The fact that Avarosis is saying what he's saying - and that his points are reverberating throughout the glbt community - is telling. There's a divide among the glb population: some people are completely behind the trans community, willing to forsake their own chance to pass ENDA, while others think more pragmatically. They sympathize with transgendered and transsexual people, but think any progress, even incremental progress, is important. Obviously, people who identify as the latter have questions about whether or not "glbt" is actually one community, or two, or something else.

On one point, Avarosis is as right as a 90 degree angle: if people speak against a completely inclusive ENDA or about how transgendered people fit in the glbt movement, they're immediately labeled by some as transphobic or George Bush Republicans. Heck, Mike's latest blog on the matter was primarily meant to point people out to this response to Avarosis, written by Susan Stryker, an academic on glbt and trans issues. Mike loved the essay, I think it's exactly what's wrong with the GLBT community. For someone who purports to be an academic, I've never seen such a hit piece on someone who would otherwise be an ally (after all, Avarosis says he's for trans rights, he just supports a different way of getting there). Instead of sticking to why Avarosis is wrong, Stryker writes pages to cast Avarosis as either dumb or a charter member of Team 'Ophobia.

This coming from an ex-Republican, former congressional aide, Georgetown-educated, inside-the-Beltway lawyer who studied under Secretary of State Madeleine Albright...

See what I mean? We can't listen to Avaroris, because he used to be a Republican! Never mind the fact that he operates one of the largest progressive blogs on the internet and is in fact gay, there was a point in time where a R used to appear beside his name. Sacrilege! Apparently, being a life-long Democrat is a new litmus test for the greater progressive movement. Let's all go fire Kos from DailyKos, because he used to be a Republican too.

I keep saying this and I don't think people understand what I mean by it - we need to have some serious discussions inside the glbt movement. I should be able to create a post on this subject without having to worry about QueerToday frantically writing posts saying "how dare I" even talk about this sort of issue. How dare I? Well, it's important! If they wanted to be productive, instead of vindictive, they'd be the ones hosting these discussions to help inform and persuade the masses (which I attempted to do on my last LeftAhead podcast, to the praise of at least one person who identifies as transgender).

People need to be able to talk about these issues rationally, free from fear of being publicly tarred and feathered, if we want to count on them being there with us when it really matters (like when a Democrat is elected President). A sizable number of gays, lesbians and bisexual people don't understand what's going on or how we got to be here. We're supposed to tell them to shut up? Or, even worse, ridicule them when they speak their mind?

While I reject Trevor from QueerToday's description of me, even if he were right in saying I have a "chillingly unconcerned white gay male middle to upper class stance on this issue," would that make my view any less important? Do certain gay people in the glbt community not count? (By the way, Trevor, thanks for the lack of curiosity and rush to judgements, but I'm far from being upper class - I come from a single parent home, with a nurse for a mother.) For a movement that demands inclusiveness, we're certainly willing to write off a large number of people for being white, male or middle-to-upper class - millions upon millions, in fact.

Unless we have this dialogue now, the entire movement is screwed. These sorts of attacks, be they QueerToday or Susan Stryker, are the worst kind of obstruction. It's funny, but sometimes I think the glbt population is its own worst enemy: there are those who question why certain things are the way they are, while others scream and yell and attack any of them who raise their voices to ask. Which is worse? Maybe Frank should just totally shelve both ENDAs because, quite frankly, not only are they highly unlikely to pass, I don't know if we actually deserve it.