Hoadley will be stepping down in order to help the Kalamazoo, Mich.-based group One Kalamazoo protect the city’s nondiscrimination ordinance. A popular vote determining the fate of the ordinance will occur on November 3; the vote comes after opponents gathered enough signatures on petitions against the ordinance.

“Being able to work with an organization I truly care about has been inspiring,” Hoadley said in a statement on Monday. “Every day Stonewall Democrats are doing the ‘boots on the ground’ work to elect pro-equality Democrats. I’m eager to continue supporting the organization in the future and watching its continued growth.”

A press release on the Stonewall Democrats’ website said that “Hoadley increased the number of regional chapters from 90 to 120″ and “increased participation by chapters in the Democratic National Convention by 33 percent.”

Chief Operating Officer Kyle Bailey will act as interim executive director until a permanent replacement is found.

The university already has suspended McMackin for 30 days without pay. He’s volunteered to take an additional 7 percent pay cut from his $1.1 million salary.

The coach also has apologized for using the gay slur during a media briefing last week at the WAC football preview in Salt Lake City.

The WAC said Monday it reprimanded McMackin for violating the conference’s sportsmanship code. The league says any further violations will result in a minimum one-game suspension.

“Coach McMackin’s comments were clearly offensive, violated the WAC Code, and are not condoned by either Hawaii or the WAC,” WAC commissioner Karl Benson said in a statement.

Benson said he appreciates the quick and decisive actions by Hawaii Chancellor Virginia Hinshaw and athletic director Jim Donovan,” as it has made my job in processing this very unfortunate situation much easier.”

Remember a few months back when it was announced that gay couples, even married ones, were going to be listed as “unmarried partners” in the 2010 Census? Well you can put away the harangue you had all prepared for the census taker. Hitched gay couples will have their relationships counted.

The Commerce Department reversed a policy with a legal opinion that  argued the Defense of Marriage Act does not mean the Census cannot release raw data on gay pairs. Aside from the fairness of it all, this is a boon for research purposes. While talking about LGBT life is rather easy (heck, they even let me do it), it would be nice if there was just a base of raw data especially when it comes to marriage. Sure many folk have done yeoman work when it comes to gay crunching numbers, but the more information we have the better it is for the cause.

Aside from the stats, this move is typical of the  Obama not enough people paid attention to during the campaign.  It is undramatic, lacks sex appeal, and makes people yawn. But that is how the president operates. If he makes any moves on the gay rights agenda (and the jury is still out on that), anything he does will be below the fold. Small, yet significant moves, that reverberate beyond the news cycle. He’s not going to tackle the topic head on. We can debate if that’s the best strategy, and if it is any different from people who came before him; however,  he is who he is.

Monday was their first chance to sign up and obtain dozens of the same legal protections as spouses.

Fifty-six-year-old Janice Czyscon (SIZE’-kon) and her partner of 29 years, 57-year-old Crystal Hyslop, arrived at the Dane County offices in Madison at 5:12 a.m. and waited in the rain until the doors opened.

Wisconsin is the first Midwestern state to enact protections for same-sex couples through legislation. Gov. Jim Doyle proposed the plan, and the Democratic-controlled Legislature approved it in the state budget.

Some who want the law invalidated say it conflicts with the state’s constitutional ban on gay marriage.

Yeah, me either.

And yet, Rachel led off with the story that somehow busloads these people are popping up all over the country at town meetings, screaming about how they would rather leave that tumor right where it is than let the country take care of its own like every other freaking industrialized nation on the planet go all commie pinko socialist, which for some reason we’re worrying about again after 30 years of not.

Not to mention putting the poor health insurance companies through the hell of having to compete with an entity that doesn’t have an active incentive to overcharge people and deny them coverage when they get sick.

I believe the town hall screamers usually set up discreet crying booths just in case people become too overwhelmed with pity for the insurance industry.

As much as this looks like a buildup to a standard tale of lobbyist sleazebaggery in the fight over health care reform, it isn’t.

It’s a buildup to a tale of such brazen sleazebaggery and outright lying that you may need to have a friend come over to help you close your jaw and put your eyeballs back in.

[Should the need arise, think carefully about which friend you pick. Once your eyeballs pop out the first time, it counts as a pre-existing condition. And the fine print in your Certificate of Insurance gives your provider’s friendly representatives the right to cover your friend with ants and/or slugs until he admits to helping you reinsert them in a non-approved home-based ocular resocketing procedure.]

Even the wonderful Eugene Robinson of The Washington Post seemed impressed by the level of open, unadulterated public evil involved. A spokesperson for the Cheney family described them as “all a-twitter”.

If you want to see the level to which our political discourse has sunk, you can find the story and download a pdf of the memo over at Think Progress.

How do you not know you’re a dirtball when you’re lying and actively trying to stop legitimate discussion and information from coming out?

I would love to see what these people say on Career Day at their kids’ schools. Do you think they just brazen it out, or do they have to spend a little time weeping and shaking in the broom closet beforehand?

Breaking News
Rachel gave us some hopeful news for Laura Ling and Euna Lee, the Current TV journalists who were sentenced to a labor camp in North Korea: Bill Clinton is flying in to try to help.

I am a huge admirer of Bill Clinton’s skills as an inspiring speaker and of his intellect, but I’ll be honest: I kind of hope he’ll turn on the Bubba a little and charm the Dear Leader’s socks off.

Lemon Aid
Rachel noted that the government’s Cash for Clunkers program is kind of genius: with just one stone it stimulates the economy and helps take inefficient cars off the road. And it’s been successful beyond anyone’s wildest dreams.

Which means Republicans, who six months after the election have still failed to define a single policy other than “Whatever Is the Opposite of what Obama Just Said,” are in the hilariously awkward position of explaining why the program is secretly a complete failure that must be stopped.

Enjoy the Republican cognitive dissonance and the gruff charm of Senator Sherrod Brown (D – Ohio).

Ms. Information
Rachel reported that the Post 9/11 G.I. Bill, originally proposed by Senator Jim Webb (D – Virginia) and some whippersnapper named Barack Obama, is starting to go into effect.

Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America has a web page set up to help veterans sort out and apply for their new benefits.

As Rachel pointed out, the post World War II G.I. Bill led to an era about which many Republicans are nostalgic. How will they manage to figure out a context in which the new version is actually awful? I can’t wait!

The Ensign Affair
Hey, remember Senator John Ensign (R – Nevada) and his icky affair?

Of course you do, because once you have that mental image of him and his staffer locked in a passionate embrace against the copier while her husband, Ensign’s other staffer, composes blackmail letters in the supply closet and the married couple’s teenage son, Ensign’s other other staffer doing, um, advanced political consulting regarding the Halo 2 vote or something in the spare office, your brain just won’t let it go.

You’ll just be innocently waxing the car or organizing your stamp collection and then WHAM! Your brain whips it out on you and suddenly you’re incapacitated with a case of the yucks for the rest of the afternoon.

Anyway, some new e-mails have come to light and Rachel has been looking carefully at the affair’s timeline (and, I hope, wearing protective gear while doing so, because cases of advanced Senatorial affair willies are definitely not covered by most nongovernmental health plans).

Turns out that some more of Ensign’s colleagues at the National Republican Senatorial Committee also knew about the affair and were forced to deal with prolonged bouts of illicit interoffice snogging heebie-jeebies when they were supposed to be getting Republican Senators elected.

Worked out great, didn’t it? NRSC, are you sure you’re still totally cool with all this?

Happy Birther Day
How can you stay mad at the birthers when they make something as wonderful as this next clip happen?

Rachel gets dramatic and Ana Marie Cox (hooray!) brings the hammer down on the racism that underlies all the birther nonsense.

Ms. Cox also gives a great defense of why informed mockery of awful people like the birthers is not just appropriate, but important.

It is, in fact, our civic duty to point out the absurdity of these spring-loaded buffoons at every turn and our social duty to refuse to take them seriously for even one minute while they insist on doing this.

Plus, it’s fun. Enjoy.

I spent much of Saturday scouring the Internet for news and shaking my head. Fortunately there are a lot of people out there who had better ideas than me.

In Israel, LGBT leaders met with representatives from the Social Affairs Ministry to highlight the awful statistics on hate crimes and abuse against young people. Minister Isaac Herzog agreed that this weekend’s attack was a form of “social terror” and has ordered his ministry to set up a special program to help LGBT youth.

Community workers in Israel have already noticed that the immediate and moving response from the LGBT community and its supporters has helped to break the silence around hate crimes – phone centers have added staffers as more people than ever before have gained the courage to report attacks.

If you’re feeling the urge to fight this weekend’s attack with positive action, it has never been easier to make a difference in the worldwide LGBT community.

The International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission has an impressive record on working for LGBT rights around the world, including pressuring Amnesty International to include persecution based on orientation in its list of human rights abuses, helping to set up asylum programs for gays and lesbians fleeing hostile countries, and training and assisting human rights workers and HIV/AIDS workers.

Their resources page lists a huge array of national and international LGBT groups, so you can pick the area where you’d like to lend a hand.

The International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association is a collection of national and local groups that work together for equal rights across the map.

And of course there is plenty to be done right here at home. Only nineteen states and the District of Columbia have laws that protect against discrimination based on sexual orientation, and only twelve of those (and D. C.) have laws that forbid discrimination based on gender identity.

Hitting the streets to flyer or canvass, phone banking, envelope stuffing, or just getting on the horn and bugging your state representatives are all ways to make sure things get better for all of us down the road.

And we can’t underestimate the importance of staying out and proud to make sure don’t lose the gains we’ve made. It can be as simple as taking a moment to kindly but firmly correct the neighborhood kid who’s trying to get up a game of “smear the queer,” or keeping in touch with that younger cousin you met at the family reunion – the one you’re pretty sure is going to turn out to be gay and may have a tough adolescence ahead of him in that small town.

We can’t, unfortunately, magically make the world a safe and accepting place for people in the LGBT community. But we get closer every time we tackle a little corner of it.

Thanks to Kate Walsham for her help in sourcing.

The court said its five judges ruled 3-2 against an appeal lodged by the women two years ago.

Teresa Pires and Helena Paixao, divorced mothers in their 30s who have been together as a couple since 2003, were turned away by a Lisbon registry office when they attempted to marry in 2006 because the law stipulates that marriage is between people of different genders.

Portugal’s constitution, however, also forbids discrimination based on sexual orientation. The women took the case to a Lisbon court, which rejected their unprecedented challenge.

After considering their appeal against that decision, the Constitutional Court said in a statement posted on its Web site that the constitution does not state that same-sex marriages must be permitted.

The court said the question before it was not whether the constitution allows same-sex marriages, but whether the constitution compels them to be accepted, which it does not.

Paixao told The Associated Press by telephone she regarded the decision as “a victory” because the split decision demonstrated that attitudes are changing in Portugal.

“It shows there’s a change coming. Bit by bit people will come around” and accept gay marriage, she said.

In the meantime, the two intend to take their legal battle to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France, she said.

Gay marriage is permitted in five European countries – Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and Norway.

In Portugal, which is an overwhelmingly Roman Catholic country, efforts to introduce gay marriage have hit resistance from religious groups and conservative lawmakers.

However, the center-left Socialist Party has included a proposal to permit same-sex marriages in its manifesto for September’s general election. Its chief rival, the center-right Social Democratic Party, opposes the measure. Opinion polls show the two parties are neck-and-neck in voting intentions.

Last year, Portugal’s Parliament voted by a large majority against proposals tabled by smaller parties to allow same-sex marriages. The Socialists said at the time the issue needed a fuller debate.

The Socialist Party overcame strong opposition from the Catholic church to legalize abortion two years ago, saying it was part of the Portugal’s process of modernization.

The Portuguese delegation of the International Lesbian and Gay Association, which has supported the women’s challenge, called on Parliament to resolve the dispute.

Politicians must “fight discrimination and defend the fundamental right of equality,” it said in a statement.

Five years ago, Portugal extended some legal benefits – such as joint tax returns – to people who live together, including gays. However, the concessions fell far short of the entitlements gained by marriage.

The promotion of LGBT priests has been a huge source of controversy within the Episcopalian Church recently, but liberal branches are showing a heartening determination to press forward with equal treatment for promotion.

Read the full story in the New York Times.

The bill would create a special division in DOHMH that would be involved in research and LGBT youth outreach programs.

Read Scott Stiffler’s full story at edgeboston.com.