Blurbex

That’s the question progressive District 55 voters should think about before they vote in their August 26 primary. Human rights activists uncovered a 2-year-old video of State Rep. Darryl Rouson on a local talk show and sent it out to media this week that shows the former NAACP president making some inane comments about same-sex adoptions and gays and lesbians in general.

From the video, which CL’s PoHo posted here):

“I think it is wrong to allow adoptions of children by gay and lesbian couples. It sends a wrong message early to a child during formative years that’s hard to overcome just by sitting down and talking to them. …”

“I think lesbianism and homosexuality is morally wrong. The law is supposed to discriminate sometimes, in some respects, it is supposed to discriminate against social order and anarchy.”

In a response to the video, Rouson told the Times he’s “evolved” since that 2006 taping of Florida This Week.

In an interview with me last month, I asked Rouson if any of his values had changed since he changed from a Republican to Democrat to run for the Florida State House seat 55. Here’s an excert:

Did you switch parties for political expediency or a change in your values?

My values have remained constant and consistent for the last 20 years. The ones who are most harping about the political party change are those who feel the most threatened by it. And that is my opponent. No one in the Democratic Party is angry or criticizing the 50,000 change in registrations that’s been occurring over the last several years. In fact, the Democrats are celebrating that, for the first time in 50 years, because of the influx of new registrations of Democrats, we now lead in party affiliation in this county. So, to me it’s a little disingenuous to try and attack me only on that.

In contrast to Rouson’s past comments, his primary opponent, the Rev. Charles McKenzie, has long advocated for gay and lesbian rights. In my interview with him in May, McKenzie did mention his position on human rights. He’s a longtime fixture in progressive circles and also sits on the board has been involved with the Florida ACLU, which supports same-sex adoptions.

So back to the main question: Do you think Rouson’s newfound tolerance is heartfelt, or just a political ploy?

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Despite the efforts of some community activists, it looks like the huge Confederate Flag  at I-75 and I-4 will still fly.

As the Confederate Flag Dude himself told me last month: “The flag is going to be flown. As long as I have breath in my body and am able to function and articulate. And even if I’m gone, it doesn’t make a difference, the flag is going up.”

So, I think those opposed to the flag need to think beyond trying to change the minds of those proclaiming “Southern Heritage.” They need to think of a suitable response.

Enter: the Alleycat Players.

The local arts group wants you to submit your own flags that define the South.

From their website:

We’re accepting artists’ submissions in both digital format and as physical fabric art creations. We’re going to create an art exhibit that combines displaying the fabric art flags with large-scale projections of the digital creations.

We will be accepting artwork and forming alliances with other artistic/cultural groups for this project through May of 2009, and will be arranging our exhibition for June-July 2009.

Create flags that are representative of our better selves and our varied traditions, and we’ll fly them all!

Something tells me the Confederate Flag Dude is not going to like this …

(h/t to Calebism)

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Now that the Rays have abandoned plans for a waterfront stadium at the Al Lang Field site (for now), preservationists and community leaders are once again petitioning the city to preserve the site as a park.

At tomorrow’s 8:30 a.m. St. Petersburg City Council meeting, councilmember Jeff Danner plans to introduce a resolution to designate the Al Lang Field site as “Downtown Center Park.” The resolution is supported by the city’s Council Of Neighborhood Associations and St. Pete Preservation Inc.

Will Michaels, a CONA board member and president of St. Pete Preservation Inc. sent out an e-mail to members today:

Designation of Al Lang as part of the park zoning will prevent condos and other large buildings from being built on the Al Lang site. It would still allow a Ray’s major league regular season stadium to be built on the site, although that would require a referendum to be approved. The current small spring-training Al Lang stadium may remain on the site. This could be used for high school, college, or Little Leagure baseball, or for cultural activities (plays and concerts), or a new permanent location for the popular Saturday Morning Market, etc. The small Al Land Stadium fits the site and still provides green space and views of the bay for the public. One of our most precious assets is our Downtown Waterfront Park. Placing Al Lang under the downtown park zoning will further help to preserve the Waterfront Park for future generations.

Last year, I reported on residents’ push for this waterfront protection. But the day after I filed my story, the Rays came out with their own plan for the site, completely changing the narrative.

CONA president Barbara Heck already wrote the City Council supporting the resolution, but Michaels says all concerned residents need to contact the City Council to show their support.

(Photo courtesy of Tim Baker)

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I always knew Florida contributed disproportionately to Fark.com and News of the Weird entries, but it looks like we’ve earned another distinction: disproportionate effect on global warming.

According to growth management watchdogs 1000 Friends of Florida, Florida’s largest metro areas pump out more greenhouse gases per person than in other large cities. They’re basing the info on a recent report by the Brookings Institution that ranks the carbon emissions of 100 metro areas.

From their press release:

Florida’s metro areas increased their per capita carbon footprints much more dramatically than average in the period between 2000 and 2005. The biggest increase was from transportation, ranging from a 4.6 percent increase in Jacksonville to a whopping 58.6 percent in Sarasota-Bradenton-Venice. By comparison, the average increase in per capita footprint from transportation in the nation’s 100 largest metro areas was 2.4 percent.

Well, damn. Like any Floridian, my first response is to blame the tourists, but I don’t think that explanation flies on this one. It’s our growth patterns. It’s our sprawl. Our short-sighted government leaders.

So, which Florida cities fared the worst in the report?

Jacksonville, Sarasota-Bradenton-Venice and Cape Coral-Fort Myers. Surprisingly, Miami did the best of the Florida cities mentioned, ranking 30th in tons of carbon emited per person.

Good news though: Overall, we aren’t the worst. That distinction goes to folks in places like Lexington (Kentucky), Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Toledo, Louisville, Nashville and Oklahoma City.

Ha! Take that Rusty Belters! Al Gore is gonna run wild on you!

Ahem. As for us in the Tampa Bay area, we rank a mediocre 53rd.

Check out the full report here.

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That word comes up a lot in my interview with Beth Littrell, the Lambda Legal attorney who is representing Janice Langbehn in her suit against a Miami hospital. As I mentioned in a previous post, Jackson Memorial Hospital denied Langbehn access to her dying partner, Lisa Marie Pond, because Langbehn was not a “family member” — even though she and Pond were in an 18-year relationship, were raising four kids together and had the paperwork to prove it. The fine folks at ImGay.TV taped my conversation with Littrell during the opening-night reception for last week’s St. Pete Pride weekend. Besides proving once and for all that stripes aren’t slimming (on me, at least), the tape offers useful detail, as explained by the articulate Ms. Littrell, about the background and status of the case. See if you don’t agree with both of us that what happened to Langbehn was “outrageous.”

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The St. Pete Pride weekend kicked off last night with A Taste of Pride, a reception at Nova 535, where I got a chance to talk with Janice Langbehn, the grand marshal of Saturday’s parade. Langbehn seems a bit abashed by the lofty title, but her story needs to be told, and the Pride organizers made a brilliant political decision in helping to draw renewed attention to that story this week.

In Miami last year, Langbehn was about to embark on a cruise with her partner of 18 years, Lisa Marie Pond, and three of their four adopted children, when Pond suffered a brain aneurysm and was taken to Jackson Memorial Hospital. According to a lawsuit filed Wednesday against the hospital, the staff “refused to accept information from Langbehn regarding Pond’s medical history, informing her that she was in an antigay city and state and that she could expect to receive no information or acknowledgment as family.” Langbehn and her children were denied access to Pond for nearly eight hours. When the family was finally allowed to see her, the priest was administering last rites. Langbehn, with the help of Lambda Legal, is now suing the hospital and staffers for “negligent infliction of emotional distress.”

What happened to Langbehn — a heartless, by-the-book bureaucratic foul-up if there ever was one — could become even more commonplace after November’s election. If demagogues convince Florida voters that a same-sex marriage ban, already a law, should also be enshrined in the state constitution, the same thing could happen to anyone in Florida who defines family as other than one man/ one woman in a state-approved union. Unmarried heterosexual couples, senior citizens living together as companions, committed same-sex partners raising a family in relationships lasting 10, 20, 50 years — all of them would be at risk of being treated the same way as Janice Langbehn was treated.

Only if Amendment 2 passes, it won’t be just boneheaded hospital staffers denying people their civil rights. It’ll be the Florida Constitution.

If for no other reason than to show the world that you don’t want that to happen, march in the Pride parade Saturday and show your support for a grand marshal who deserves all the support we can give.

Later this week, I’ll be posting my interview, captured on ImGay.TV, with Lambda Legal’s Beth Littrell, who’s handling Langbehn’s case. And on Saturday, look for Creative Loafing staffers, including myself, riding the Azalea fire truck in the parade and handing out copies of the Openly Gay Issue and special CL “branded” condoms — much better than “beeeeaaaads.” And check out CL’s booth at 25th & Central.

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The Florida Professional Firefighters union is joining the campaign to stop Amendment 2, the Florida Marriage Protection Amendment.

According to SayNo2.com, the firefighters union has joined the campaign in light of a recent Michigan Supreme Court ruling that found a similar amendment to interfere with public employees’ ability to extend benefits to domestic partners.

Other supporters of Florida Red and Blue include the League of Women Voters, NAACP, the Florida Education Association and Florida CFO Alex Sink.

In other news, the proponents of Amendment 2 over at Yes2Marriage.org are growing increasingly concerned over California’s decision to allow gay marriage’s.

They also can’t spell and have terrible sentence construction:

“All 27 states that have had marriage amendments on the ballot have one, except Arizona who lost by a couple of points. In Arizona they stopped promoting the idea so called gay marriage altogether and created a new argument and tactic.” - Yes2marriage.org, under opponents arguments.

Who’s in charge of their website?!

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Yet another reason why I’m not happy Publix is taking over Albertson’s stores across St. Petersburg.

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Honda Motors has announced it will be soon releasing a hydrogen-electric car in California. The Honda FCX Clarity runs on a combination of a hydrogen fuel and an electric motor.

The FCX Clarity mixes hydrogen and oxygen to produce electricity to power an electric motor, which drives the wheels. The only exhaust it emits is water and heat.

Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the known universe, constituting around 75 percent of the universe’s elemental mass. In addition it also has a higher energy content per weight than any other fuel. Considered an energy carrier (like electricity), as opposed to an energy source (like gasoline), hydrogen can be added to other fuels or burned by itself.

The car gets the equivalent of 74 miles-per-gallon and can go around 300 miles on a tank. It has a top speed of about 100 miles-per-hour.

For now, the FCX Clarity is only being released in what’s-green-is-chic Southern California because there are hydrogen-fueling stations in the area necessary to keep it on the road. Honda received more than 50,000 lease applications but was limited to approving only those applicants who lived near one of three hydrogen refilling stations in SoCal.

While hydrogen is remarkably cleaner and more efficient than fossil fuels, an obstacle in the way of widespread hydrogen cell vehicles is actually making hydrogen fuel, a process which often produces the same greenhouse gases hydrogen-driven motors are designed to replace. Scientists are working on ways to use wind and solar power to make hydrogen fuel.

Another obstacle for hydrogen stems from the memory of the ill-fated “Hindenburg” — that hydrogen is volatile and dangerous. If we can use modern technology to control nuclear power, however, we would surely have no problem controlling hydrogen cell motors.

It will be interesting to see how this technology and other fuel technologies develop over the next few years as fossil fuels become more scarce (and expensive) and the oil-producing parts of the world become more volatile. Several other automobile manufacturers are working on releasing hydrogen-powered vehicles.

Honda is planning to have a few dozen FCX Clarity vehicles available for consumers this year and 200 available within three years. Three year leases will run about $600 a month.

(photo by BBQ Junkie)

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It’s not often I’m surprised by an article in one of our local papers. As a native Floridian, few things surprise me about this state anymore (News of the Weird — that’s all I have to say).

But a front page story in today’s Times did it:

Celebratory gunfire is a statewide problem

What?!

From the article:

Celebratory gunfire like the kind that precipitated the fatal shooting of Javon Dawson at a crowded graduation party Saturday night is on the rise around Tampa Bay and the state, causing injuries and even deaths, say law enforcement officials.

This is so much of a problem that St. Pete police even created a public service announcement in April warning party people about the dangers of celebrating with guns (as if the laws of physics are lost on these pistol-wielding revelers).

What is this? Pakistan?!

Anyway, the news about this surrounds the recent shooting of a 17-year-old black teen by a white St. Pete police officer. Last weekend, police responded to a graduation party after calls about celebratory gunfire. According to police, Javon Dawson had a gun and pointed it at police. They shot him twice.

Back to celebratory gunfire: the article above quotes a Gulfport police officer who says on New Year’s Eve, you can’t go 30 seconds without hearing gunfire. In fact, the department even has a special unit to deal with such crimes. I have to admit, I’ve been out of town for New Year’s the past two years. Anybody else hear celebratory gunfire in their neighborhood on New Year’s Eve?

Am I just close-minded and blind to the cultural differences in our state? Or is this quite possibly one of the stupidest trends in Tampa Bay, right after bead throwing?

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