News around the Union

First the Best News: Loving couples in Washington DC are now able to marry.



New Hampshire: townships in New Hampshire voted on marriage Tuesday--or rather, voted on voting on it. From the Blend:

News is still trickling in, but of the 50 or so towns we do have results for, the vast majority have voted for the anti-equality warrant, often by overwhelming margins.

You can spin it better:

Let's put this non-binding nonsense into context and be honest about what it meant for non-SB2 towns. It meant the deliberation of a tiny fraction of a town's voting population, the median age of which is, let's be frank, likely well above the town's average.

And then add to that the fact that these petition articles are among the last items of business. At my town meeting, we got to the anti-marriage article, iirc, around 11:30pm, over four hours into the meeting. Probably a solid third or more of the good folks who began the meeting weren't even around at that point. And those are the ones who had (or didn't need) someone to watch young kids, so, tough luck for full representation from younger families.

But still, the haters are more motivated than the friends to get out there. Sad.

Update: not as bad as we thought. Turns out that the majority of towns refused to even put this "warrant" to the vote: Passing the article in only 53 towns out 234 towns and cities means that barely 23% of New Hampshire's towns and cities voted to put discrimination in New Hampshire's constitution. In other words, 77% of towns and cities rejected institutionalized bigotry. This is a resounding failure for the anti-equality activists

Minnesota is holding hearings on marriage equality. I suspect unlikely to pass, but that they are being held is a step. From the Prop8TrialTracker Tracker:

The Minnesota Hearings with a video of the testimony
University of Minnesota Law Professor Dale Carpenter goes through all the myths that the right wing has been spreading. He simply eviscerates all of the hateful testimony of the speakers before him. He presents the facts as they, not as the right-wing tries to fear people into believing. All in all, a terrific job.

If you have several hours this weekend, take a look at the whole video. If not, check out Prof. Carpenter’s testimony. It’s moving and logical at the same time. As he said, it is time for the state to say yes to the people.

Florida:
Most states are eager to recruit movie and television productions, which bring in lots of jobs in set design, catering, security, bit parts, etc. etc. Florida is no exception. Unless, apparently, the film or TV script has any gay characters:

Movies and TV shows with gay characters could be ineligible for a "family-friendly" tax credit in Florida under a little-noticed provision tucked into a $75 million incentive package that Republican House leaders hope will attract film and entertainment jobs to the state.

The bill would prohibit productions with "nontraditional family values" from receiving a so-called family-friendly tax credit.