West Point grad among Gay Pride Parade marshals

Army National Guard Lt. Dan Choi, shown at a Fresno rally in May, will be one of six celebrity grand marshals at the Gay Pride Parade on Sunday morning in San Francisco. (Gary Kazanjian / AP)

Meredith May, Chronicle Staff Writer

When Army National Guard Lt. Dan Choi fell in love, he couldn’t stop talking about it.

Except for one tiny lie. Matthew, his beloved, became "Martha."

Choi lived in a "don’t ask, don’t tell" world, an Arabic-speaking West Point graduate and combat veteran of the Iraq war, whose future career, health and housing benefits depended on a smooth relationship with the military.

Caught between fear and freedom, Choi finally couldn’t take it anymore. In March, the 28-year-old Harvard student and his friends formed a support group for gay West Point graduates called Knights Out, and a week later, he put on his uniform and went on MSNBC’s "Rachel Maddow Show".

Cameras rolling, he said three words that would rocket him to the front of the gay rights movement and earn him an invitation to be one of six celebrity grand marshals in Sunday’s Gay Pride Parade:

"I am gay."

Then, his microphone cut out. It remains a technological mystery.

But the roar he created has not died down.

The New York Army National Guard sent Choi a letter in May telling him proceedings had begun to remove him from the military for "moral and professional dereliction." And two days after Choi appears in the Pride Parade, he will have to defend himself in military court.

"I have to prove it’s not immoral to tell the truth," he said.

Members of his military unit have written letters of support and offered to testify on his behalf. More than 70 West Point graduates came out of the closet and joined Knights Out.

Many supporters

Since appearing on Maddow’s show, Choi has seen his in-box crowded with e-mail calling him a hero. Although he came out to his parents months before going on television, his mother and his Southern Baptist preacher father in Orange County continued to tell him he was shameful.

Choi took a leave from his Middle East and Religious Studies master’s degree program at Harvard to do media interviews, and to take a trip to Italy to celebrate out loud with Matthew, a sales executive for Gucci.

"Coming out has turned into a full-time job," he said.

Choi has never been to a gay pride parade before, and he’s thrilled to be part of one of the largest ones in the country. Hundreds of thousands are expected to watch more than 200 floats cruise down Market Street, ushered in by a celebrity grand marshal court that includes Oscar-winning actress Cloris Leachman and "Milk" movie producers Bruce Cohen and Dan Jinks. His San Francisco visit will be life changing - but brief. On Tuesday Choi is due back at the New York National Guard Armory in Syracuse at 8 a.m., to stand trial before a panel of colonels who will decide whether to kick Choi out of the military.

He’s prepared for whatever comes. Nothing is worse, he said, than living a lie.

"National security means many things, but the thing that makes us secure in our nation and homes is love - what makes me a better soldier, leader, Christian and human being is love and I didn’t want to keep hiding it," Choi said.

Choi will be joined in the parade by his younger sister, one of the first family members he confided in. Twenty-eight members of Knights Out are flying in from around the country to walk behind his car in the parade.

"Living in San Francisco, we can think that all the LGBT rights have been won, but Choi’s story shows there is still workplace discrimination where people are frightened to come out and live authentically," said Lindsey Jones, executive director of the Pride Parade.

At least 12,500 discharged

At least 12,500 gays and lesbians have been discharged from military service for violating the "don’t ask, don’t tell" policy, a political compromise forged when Bill Clinton was president. An estimated 65,000 are believed to be currently serving in the military.

Barack Obama campaigned for the presidency on a promise to repeal the ban on gays in the military, but has yet to take action. On Monday, 77 members of Congress signed a letter to Obama urging him to repeal the ban. In it, they cited Choi’s exceptional service and dedication and a May Gallup poll that found 69 percent of Americans - including 58 percent of Republicans - favor allowing openly gay men and lesbian women to serve in the military.

Becky Kanis, who kept her lover a secret until after she graduated from West Point in 1991, will be marching in the Knights Out contingent behind Choi.

It’s the first time West Point graduates have ever marched in a gay pride parade - a little historic push toward making the country a more honorable place, she said.

"Having to lie about who you are dating is what hurts unit morale," she said. "People can sense when you are hiding something, and it builds distrust."

During his 15 months in combat in Iraq, Choi helped rebuild hospitals and return soccer stadiums from torture arenas to playing fields. Because he could speak Arabic, he was vital to negotiating between the military and local governments.

And he told several members of his military unit that he was gay. None, he said, had a problem with it, especially other gay soldiers.

"If I lose all my medical benefits, I won’t get health care America," Choi said. "But we rebuilt hospitals in Iraq and the doctors I met there would help me. So we have to take a harder look at this issue of morality."

Source: The Two Malcontents RSS Feed

Vladamir Putin Gets Some New Homeboyz

A friend alerted me to this BBC story, which only sounds like a Dave Chappelle skit:Russia's energy giant Gazprom has signed a $2.5bn (£1.53bn) deal with Nigeria's state operated NNPC, to invest in a new joint venture.
The new firm, to be called Nigaz, is set to build refineries, pipelines and gas power stations in Nigeria. (emphasis added.)
Analysts say the move could further strengthen Russia's role in supplying natural gas to Europe.
The agreement comes during a four-day African tour by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.
As well as forming Nigaz, Russia is keen on developing a trans-African pipeline to transport Nigerian gas to Europe.Read the whole BBC article here, which has a few more mentions of the company's name.

Source: To the People RSS Feed

Sadik-Khan's half-baked Times Square scheme

From the Daily News:
...Sadik-Khan has produced statistics to use in making before-and-after comparisons. She has charts and graphs showing traffic volume and speeds on Fifth to 11th Aves. and on cross-streets, along with counts of pedestrian crowding, as they were measured in March and April. Those will be matched against fresh numbers gathered at the end of the summer.
The baseline numbers are fascinating and, in some cases, perplexing: They show traffic crawled at an average of 5.64 mph eastbound on 34th St. between Seventh and Eighth (been there), while it zipped at 35.2 mph hour up 10th Ave. between 45th and 50th (never done that).
Whatever. We now have the method to the commissioner's ... astuteness.
From the Huffington Post:
What is wrong is that the present solution is neither safer nor more pedestrian friendly.
The execution of the project was both sloppy and ill-conceived if it was meant to serve people who live here or are trying to walk on Broadway. Take a trip with me up Broadway on foot if you dare.
Start downstairs from where I am writing on 34th Street, where the street in front of Macy's has been closed off. Most of it has been blocked by metal chairs and tables, intersected by a bike lane.
If cars in Manhattan often push the rules, the bike riders ignore them entirely. They wear armor while their victims on foot go unprotected. It is not uncommon to be grazed by a high speed biker getting between you and some barrier at speed.
Today it is harder to pass through Times Square on foot than when cars were whizzing back and forth.
Photo from India Ink

Source: Queens Crap RSS Feed

6/22 Roundup: Surface Calm in Iran, Chuck Schumer Goes it Alone, Draft Ramirez!

Leader: Surface Calm in Iran

- After another day of massive street protests in Iran on Saturday (check out this video I posted here of the protesters chasing off the government shock troops), yesterday was a day of "relative calm," at least on the surface of society. Peel back that veneer, however, and one finds evidence of a serious struggle in the highest reaches of power, and millions of Iranians preparing for a showdown with their government this week. Ayatollah Khamenei arrested several members of Ali Rafsanjani, a former president who leads several important councils, and was seen as an attempt to quiet Rafsanjani's challenge to Khamenei.

- The government of Iran has admitted a discrepancy of three million votes in their election-- more ballots were cast than there are eligible voters in the country. The Guardian Council said it is "not clear" if the discrepancy would "decisively change" the election result. Remember last week Ayatollah Khamenei was telling us the election results were fair, and that an 11 million vote gap was too big to fake. Well, 11 million doesn't seem so big anymore, and and the Ayatollah seems to have jumped before counting.

Politics

- Paul Krugman has written off the Republican side of the Senate, but sees the possibility for a few renegade "centrist" Democrats to scuttle health care reform. Chuck Schumer, for one, is ready to go it alone.

- Sen. John Ensign has seen a 14-point slide since announcing his extramarital affair. If he's through, who will replace him as the Senator from Nevada? Draft Ramirez!

Economy

- The welfare rolls are growing for the first time since Bill Clinton reformed the program more than a decade ago. And reporting from the WaPo indicates that it could be a long time before jobs start returning to our economy.

- Oil has fallen to near $68/barrel, but this isn't really good news for our economy.

International

- The Chinese government has ordered all PC manufacturers to load Green Dam censoring software on their computers. Purportedly, this is intended to filter pornography, but it could be used to censor politically sensative content, as well. The U.S. State Department has filed an official complaint with the Chinese government.

- The U.S. Navy is tracking a North Korean cargo ship that appears to be headed for Myanmar. This could be the first test of just how far the U.S. is willing to go in its new commitment to stop DPRK military shipments.

New From NDN

- We've been tracking the situation in Iran closely. Keep up with our ongoing analysis here, or just watch the blog.

- Check out this backgrounder of our best, recent economic work assembled by the crack team in our Globalization Initiative.

One More Thing

- Last, more video from the protests on Saturday in Iran:

Source: NDN Blog - NDN Blog RSS Feed

The revolution will be blogged - and Twittered - but perhaps not televised

The situation in Iran grows ever tenser; there may now be a recount of sorts, though it's not clear whether they'll be any more interested in counting the actual votes than they did first time out. Furthermore, the regime is clamping down on foreign news reporting in an attempt to cut off the flow of disturbing images from the streets of Teheran and other large Iranian cities.
The MSM's coverage of recent events in Iran has been somewhat uneven, reflecting in part the lack of interest in news stories which can't easily be packaged or explained to viewers in under 20 seconds, as well as the aforementioned restrictions on reporting, which make it difficult for even the John Simpsons of this world to bring us the full picture on what's happening.
But to an extent it has also brought into sharp contrast the limitations of the mainstream media. Even the BBC which, despite its myriad shortcomings and much-documented biases, remains the best source of international news coverage (Sky News is a far better channel, but cannot match the BBC's breadth and depth of foreign correspondents around the world) has occasionally been shown up as slow and cumbersome compared to some elements of "new media". Bloggers like Andrew Sullivan have been must-reads in the past few days, providing rolling real-time news updates and analysis while the Beeb is busily editing TV news packages and ponderously double-checking every story before running with it.
And opposition protesters have been Twittering from the ground in Iran, a new development whose significance cannot be overstated. I've hitherto regarded Twitter as a waste of time - largely because I've finally reached the age where I cease to understand new technologies - but after this week, whatever happens, no-one can say that it is pointless. Indeed, the people at Twitter Central even postponed scheduled maintenance downtime yesterday so as not to cut off the flow of information from Teheran. The world is changing, 140 characters at a time.
It would not do to get too misty-eyed about Mir Houssein Mousavi, the opposition leader who most observers believe picked up the majority of the popular vote. He may be a "moderate" and a "reformer", but that's compared to Ahmadinejad, which is hardly setting the bar all that high. From reading some columnists you'd think he was the love child of Lech Walesa and Vaclav Havel, but don't be fooled; Mousavi is a man of firm views on everything from terrorism to Iranian nuclear ambitions, and is no friend of the West.
But that's not really the point; if democracy is to mean anything, after all, it includes the rights of people to elect leaders we don't care for. Rather, we should take the opportunity to show solidarity with the ordinary people of Iran, who may just be seizing this "election" as the moment when they stood up and demanded the right to be heard. It's a rare moment when both right and left in the West can come together and find something to agree on - though needless to say the EU's statement recognising Ahmadinejad's "victory" was pathetic, and there are the usual suspects on the far left ("the counting was awesome") who would rather see the fanatics remain in power, since they're anti-American fanatics.
There's not a whole hell of a lot we can do, of course; and blogging about revolution from an armchair with a cold beer in your hand comes perilously close to being the very definition of narcissistic, hand-wringing circle-jerkdom. But those of you who are technically minded might consider setting up a proxy to allow Iranian bloggers to liveblog or tweet through the government's firewall. That would be a small but real contribution.
It would be nice to think that this might be the first generation of Iranians who actually had the chance to determine their own futures. It's hardly necessary, sadly, to add that the odds are very much against it.

Source: Mr Eugenides RSS Feed

Attention, Nazli Parvizi!

Nazli, how did you let these signs slip past you?

Oh my God, a death threat! Please mail a nasty letter to this woman immediately and send every city agency to her house to harass her.

The Mayor would have no problem shutting down Gracie Mansion as well as the firehouse. He doesn't live in the former and would not be affected by the latter.

Hey Jimmy, what were you doing at the protest? Remember when you said this about why Republicans should support Bloomberg?
Turns out, the City Council came up with the money yesterday to prevent these closures, as per the SI Advance:
Calling the matter "a complete victory," the City Hall source told the Advance: "The public had its voice heard, the Council members heard it, the members in turn spoke to the speaker and the speaker heard those voices."
Twelve additional yet-to-be named city fire companies have also been spared from the budget ax, according to the source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because final city budget negotiations are still ongoing.

Source: Queens Crap RSS Feed

Red Sucker - No Sucker in Ron Paul, Glenn Beck, ABC - ?

Guest post by Left Coast Rebel

As Dr. Paul notes, the cause of cost inflation is precisely due to aggressive government involvement. Paul - "The more the government is involved in an industry or service, the higher the prices go....you can't solve the problem of medical care by ignoring this. Obama says that what we are going to do is tremendously increase the services but we are going to cut all of the payments to the doctors and the hospitals....that can't possibly work."
It will work though. How you say? Rationing.
Beck is spot-on on every single point. This really shows that the 'public option' is simply a scheme to takeover 17% of the economy. Unbelievable at 2:20, Rep Jan Schakowsky stating the obvious, that, "A public option will put the private industry out of business and lead to single payer, my single payer friends, he was right!" Nice to hear the cat out of the bag like that, I wonder if she received a call from the White House?

How about this headline from Drudge here today as well -
ABC Turns Programming Over to Obama; News to be Anchored from Inside White House
Apparently Drudge got his hands on news that ABC will host a prime time special on June 24 called 'Prescription for America.' The prime-time slot will cater to the Obamanation and White House officials and give them a platform for their socialized medicine plans. Part of the 'deal' is that all opposing viewpoints are to be excluded. I wonder how the White House got such a sweetheart deal? What's that? Where is this special broadcasted from you say? The East Room of the White House. Yes, dear reader, we truly do have a slobbering state-run press in this country now.
In addition to the ABC program above, the network will devote Good Morning America, World News, Nightline and ABC's web news to 'the president's health-care agenda.' From Drudge's story too, Ken McCay of the RNC says that requests from the Republican National Committee to offer debate have been rejected. I'm sure that part of the Obamanation/ABC sweetheart deal comes into play. I don't know about you but this is one of the most preposterous and disgusting stories that I have seen under the Obamanation so far. What do any of my liberal readers think?

Source: Why Mommy is a Republican RSS Feed

A Real Turning Point in Iran?

The political unrest in nuclear-arming Iran--the largest since 1979--may or may not be a turning point in terms that would matter to the non-Islamist world. The relative reform candidate, whose election victory seems to have been stolen, believes in Iran's Islamist (clerical fascist) system.
A real turning point will come when tens of thousands of Iranians take to the streets to demand an end to the monstrous mullahocracy--death to theocracy, down with the turbaned tyranny.
Ironically, that would probably depress and disappoint America's first Muslim President (by birth and embrace of essential Islamist concepts, as shown by his awful address to "the Muslim world"). Barack Obama's entire Middle East policy is based on engaging (code for appeasing) and actually aligning with supposed Islamist moderates, including Iranian clerics, Hamas, Hezbollah, and allegedly "reconcilable" elements of the medieval Taliban. In Obama's eyes, the only Islamists that are off limits for engagement are those who belong to or are associated with Al Qaeda and its affiliates.
His idiotic ideas are backed by an unholy alliance of advisers, from the anti-Israel Cold Warrior, Zbigniew Brzezinski, architect of America's intervention in Afghanistan on the side of jihadists, to certain left-wing Democrats, who also believe that right-wing political Islam can somehow be managed or exploited, certainly accommodated.

Source: China Confidential RSS Feed