partisan issue

The U.S. House of Representatives today reauthorized the LGBT-inclusive Senate version of Violence Against Women Act, despite objections from some Republicans about language protecting LGBT, Native American, and undocumented victims of domestic violence. The bill now heads to President Obama's desk, where he has promised to sign it into law.

A 24-year-old straight Republican woman says that stopping equal rights, specifically marriage equality, is the wrong direction for her party, her state, and her country. Madeline Koch testified to the Minnesota senate April 29, arguing that the bill being considered that would constitutionally ban gay and lesbian couples from marrying goes too far and counters the sentiment of most young Republicans. Koch said that she had no ties to gay people before she started working on promoting equal rights three years ago.

LGBT history overflows with stories of women who have come to the aide of gay men: the concerned mother who founded PFLAG, the doctor who proved that homosexuality was not a pathological illness, the popular 1960s communist who wrote that gays and lesbians were born that way and should be true to themselves in order to find happiness, and the countless number of lesbians who, after years of feeling excluded from the gay liberation movement by their gay brothers, put aside their frustrations to care for them at the height of the AIDS epidemic when hospitals wouldn’t.

With four debates, and hours worth of questions and answers, the words "gay" or "lesbian" never broke through. The closest anyone ever came to bringing up LGBT issues came during the first debate when President Obama listed repeal of the "don't ask, don't tell" policy among accomplishments he said were made on behalf of the middle class. But DADT wasn't raised during Monday's last debate, which focused on foreign policy, despite its effect on the military.

The U.S. House of Representatives approved a stand-alone bill Wednesday to repeal the 17-year-old law barring lesbian and gay service members from serving openly in the military by a vote of 250-175. Rep. Patrick Murphy, who championed the repeal effort, said those who oppose repeal had exhausted “every excuse under the sun.” “Enough!” Murphy said from the House floor. “Our troops are the best of the best and they deserve a Congress that puts their safety and their collective national security over rigid partisan interests and a closed-minded ideology.”

Michigan's Governor has signed a bill granting faith-based adoption agencies in the state the power to refuse to allow LGBT people to adopt, or place foster children in homes headed by LGBT Michiganders.

In case you've been living under a rock, last week was kind of a big deal in terms of civil rights.

Russia and Nigeria are fast becoming ideological besties, while Republican leaders from Utah to New Jersey just keep making it worse for LGBT people.