Last week began with a visit to the UN from Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. After being denied a request to take a quick pee on the ruins of America’s altar of narcissism, he stopped by Columbia University to exercise his skills in western style politics.

While addressing the audience at Columbia, Ahmadinejad announced that homosexuality doesn’t exist in Iran. That statement must have been shocking to the men I saw in a photograph preparing to hang teenagers in Iran for being homosexual. If sexual variation doesn’t occur in the Middle East, it’s not because gawd’s law is being upheld. But, it might have to do with the practice of religious murder and torture that is condoned by government. Hey – if it’s impossible to live without the threat of extinction, then invisibility becomes attractive, don’t you think? Given the options, wouldn’t you consider invisibility? The government of Iran (and many other similar hot spots) is hoping you would consider it.

His remarks don’t necessarily make him a bad man. It’s not like President Ahmadinejad came up with this concept all by himself. The “if I close my eyes it doesn’t exist” method of dealing with reality thrives right here in the US of A.

It is evident in my favorite topic: marriage equality. If you listen to the religious zealots and/or the compromising, complicit, cowardly members of the Democratic Party, there is no bigotry involved in denying the existence of same sex couples. Encouraging states (let alone the federal government) to recognize LGBT families would force them to acknowledge that we exist and have done nothing to justify being denied full citizenship. There is only one place that The Family exists and that is within the framework of man-on-woman marriage. Just ask Peter Pace. While he didn’t go as far as Ahmadinejad did by saying that homosexuals don’t exist, it sure sounds like he would like us to be invisible.

Testifying midweek at a Senate hearing, the outgoing Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff restated his remarks made earlier in the year regarding the incompatibility of homosexuality and service in the armed forces. He said, “We need to be very precise then, about what I said …and that is, very simply, that we should respect those who want to serve the nation but not through the law of the land, condone activity that, in my upbringing, is counter to God’s law.”

Regardless of the fact that I doubt that this God person is too keen on war, bombs, and torture (I think it may stem from the way his “son” was reported to have died), Pace still seems to cling to his opinion that immorality is defined by sexual activity and not in the arena of killing. Further, Pace chooses to ignore the fact that the US Supreme Court has already decriminalized homosexual activity. He wants to ignore the decision of the court and cling to what he has decided is God’s law. That is what his momma told him to do and it doesn’t matter what the Supreme Court says or what any politician or deviate sympathizer says. If Pace says homosexuality shouldn’t exist, then damn it all, it shouldn’t exist.

He said: “I would be very willing and able and supportive” to changes to the (DADT) policy “to continue to allow the homosexual community to contribute to the nation without condoning what I believe to be activity…that in my upbringing is not right.”

In other words, as long you only have sex with your married different sex partner, you can kill as many people as possible and cause circumstances that kill and impoverish and maim hundreds of thousands and still be moral, according to Peter Pace and his mom. I hope I don’t ever have to meet her. She scares me.

At the close of last week, there was a burst of activity regarding ENDA legislation that has been kicking around for a decade in Congress. ENDA would make workplace discrimination against LGB people incompatible with Federal policy. The “T” was left off the description of the people that would be protected by this bill because the Democratic leadership in the House has stripped the Transgender community from the bill. They – specifically Nancy Pelosi and Barney Frank – say the bill won’t pass if transgender citizens are included.

Here is a quote from Barney Frank rationalizing his strategy to drop the T from the bill and allow the LGB part to remain:

“…their (LGBT leaders) recommendation was that the Speaker (Pelosi) simply announce that she was not going to allow the Employment Non-Discrimination Act to come up at all. I believe that would be a disaster – politically, morally, and strategically. While their reason for this would be the debate over how ultimately to achieve transgender inclusion, the impression that would be given to the country was that Speaker Pelosi, the first Democratic Speaker in thirteen years, and a lifelong strong supporter of LGBT rights, had decided that we could not go forward on what had been the major single legislative goal of gay and lesbian people for over thirty years.”

He thinks it would be immoral for the Democratic leadership to risk the bill’s passage by not compromising it. He also sounds concerned that Pelosi would look bad if she couldn’t make this bill happen. We want her to appear powerful and influential and successful, don’t we? Well, then we (LGB and especially T people) need to put our integrity and ideals on the back burner. Frank loves to caution us little people about getting too demanding. He made similar statements about marriage during the 2004 election. In his narrow and condescending view, it would be immoral of us to not compromise our integrity.

After the lessons we learned about morality this week, I think immorality is underrated. If Pace and Frank and Pelosi represent what is moral, then I’m content with being immoral.

Their definitions of morality make Ahmadinejad’s invisibility sound compelling.

I’d like to ask a question that pertains to the campaign platforms of the Democratic party candidates for President. Is this development in CA an example of the states taking care of the issue of same sex marriage? The California State Legislature is made up of two political bodies: the assembly and the senate. Both of these bodies are comprised of politicians that were elected by the citizens of California. Both of these bodies passed a bill — for the second time — that gives same sex couples the right to marriage. This legislation would undo the legislation passed in 2000 (Prop 22) that defined marriage in a way that prohibits LGBT (lesbian-gay-bi-transgender) people from being married.

Does the action of the legislature (elected by the people) represent the will of the voters or does Proposition 22 represent the will of the voters?

I think this situation is more complicated than candidates for president of the US are acknowledging. Frankly, it gets even worse the more I think about it.

Do we really want Governor Schwarzenegger to sign the bill? Of course we do. I think. What would that do to the SSM case that is before the state Supreme Court? I guess it would make it unnecessary because the people suing for marriage will no longer have a complaint.

Of course, if the governor signed the bill, the two fanatical Christian organizations that are gathering signatures to amend the state constitution against same sex marriage (and possibly all forms of relationship recognition) would be further motivated to their cause. They could really break out the fire and brimstone to push for an amendment if the governor signed. If they succeed, then the law won’t matter and the dropped lawsuits will matter even less (does that makes sense?).

But then again, even if Schwarzenegger doesn’t sign the bill the Zealots for Christ will still push to amend the constitution. They won’t rest until their religious beliefs are imposed on all Californians. So, if the bill is vetoed, the state Supreme Court will still have to decide the case and the constitution could still be amended.

Are you keeping up with me?

Now, in New York State the court said that the Legislature must act if it chooses to — it is not up to the court — to create SSM or something else, since NY State has nothing at all in place to accommodate same sex couples (even though there is nothing on the books that specifically denies it either). In New Jersey, the court forced the Legislature to act within a certain time frame. They passed Civil Union legislation and Governor signed it into law.

Listen up, Arnold: the Governor of New Jersey signed the bill. The Governor of New York submitted same sex marriage legislation to the Legislature himself and is waiting to sign it. What is your story? Oh, that’s right… you are waiting for the court case to be heard to determine whether or not LGBT Californians are due full citizenship.

This is what kills me. Isn’t anyone bothered by this shell game? I know there are extremely polarized opinions about marriage equality. I also know there is enormous ambivalence about it too — among heteros as well as homos. Don’t any of the ambivalent people feel a pang of discomfort about this process?

The people opposed to equality are engaged in rigorous legal acrobatics and will contort their agenda as much as necessary to achieve their goal. What is their goal? They seek to marginalize a minority group that they despise. They want to circumvent all methods of redress available to LGBT citizens. They do not want to let go of their privileged status and they will work feverishly to deny equality to people for whom they have contempt.

The politicians that dodge the issue or offer the platitude “let the states decide” are accomplices to the bigotry… so are the people that don’t push political leaders to take a principled stand in support of equality and fairness.

If it’s ok for the states to decide this issue, then tell me: Was this issue resolved by the voters of California in 2000, or was it decided by the voters of California when they elected and re-elected their state representatives?

Also, please tell me why it is acceptable to jerk around a minority group that is not guilty of any crime and only seeks to have the same consideration of citizenship that an imprisoned serial killer has? Charles Manson can get married without having to put up with religious fanaticism, political opportunism or feckless friends getting in his way.

Why is anyone ambivalent about the gratuitous and desperate attempts that are being made to find a way to legalize bigotry?