Ambassador and Mrs. Philip Murphy, America's diplomats-in-chief in Berlin, put their nation's support for full equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people front and center with the government of Cameroon. How the heck did that happen? It's a story of the finest in American diplomacy and...

Vietnam veteran and former Senator Chuck Hagel is the ideal man to serve as Secretary of Defense. In the small world category, I've known him for over 30 years. In all of that time, I have consistently regarded him as a man of high moral character who puts service and...

Want to know how the right-wing astroturf machine works? Want to see how they use power and money to drown out the voice of the people? Want to see the motivations behind the Koch Brothers' hit man in California?

Well then, meet David Spady, "California State...

Just as most of the nation's attention turned to the first Presidential debate in Denver last week, the Sacramento Bee reported that Charles Munger, Jr. had ponied up $9.9 million to the Small Business Action Committee PAC, a committee dedicated to defeating Prop. 30 and passing...

First they came after our families, now they are coming after our allies.

The same folks who brought us Prop. 8 four years ago, and a campaign full of lies, hate and division, are back, and this time they are targeting one of our biggest allies -- union members.

What...

That's what the banner flying over Mitt Romney's Orange County fundraiser said today. Why?

First it was Wisconsin. Then it was Ohio. Now the Koch Brothers, Karl Rove and the Tea Party have their eyes on an even bigger prize: the eighth largest economy in the...

1994: Mitt Romney tells the Log Cabin Republicans he supports ENDA, ending Don't Ask Don't Tell, and will be better on gay rights than Ted Kennedy.

2009: Mitt Romney tells CNN there should be a national standard against gay marriage.

Mitt Romney has earned a well-deserved...

Banks are among the most powerful, if not the most powerful, private institutions in the country. Sen. Durbin (D-IL) famously commented "they own the place," referring to the U.S. Senate. But once in awhile, through concerted efforts, they can be beaten.

On July 2, the California Legislature passed a...

It takes a lot to get me to write about the opinions of The Wall Street Journal because they are so consistently ideological and out of touch. To find out what they say, I can usually skip a step and just read Karl Rove's daily talking points. But last Friday,...

California began going downhill when Howard Jarvis' Prop 13 passed in 1978. Thus began the end of funded public education, libraries, road repair, healthcare, senior services and the most respected higher education system in the world. It brought us Grover Norquist, the no-nothing Republican party of 2011, and a pledge...

This piece was co-authored by Joshua Pechthalt and Anthony Thigpenn

When we think of California, we imagine the state that allowed the three of us to be who we are, a state that gave us the California Dream. For years now, that dream has been quickly slipping away and now...

Speaker Boehner has a job, and that's to create more jobs. But when he's not keeping the House from voting on the American Jobs Act, he likes to go golfing and raise money. Unfortunately for him, we at the Courage Campaign aren't about to let that stand as an excuse...

Foes of marriage equality will make a ludicrous argument before the California Supreme Court on Tuesday, Sept. 6. They will assert that anyone who has the money to put an initiative on the ballot in California and then sufficient funds to advertise its way to passage, whether relying on facts...

Eighteen months ago, the gay and lesbian equality movement won the war. It happened in U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker's San Francisco courtroom. It was called Perry v. Schwarzenegger, which resulted in a ruling overturning Prop 8. The evidence in that trial made crystal clear...

A year ago today, U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn R. Walker overturned "Prop 8," ruling that it violated both the Due Process and Equal Protection clauses of the United States Constitution.

I thought the war had finally been won. The forces of prejudice and...

I've been watching PBS for I don't know how many years. When I was a kid, I watched Sesame Street. When I got a little older, NOVA. When I turned an adult, Frontline and the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. And I know millions of Americans like me, too. It's good...

The National Organization for Marriage (NOM) is halfway through its 20-state "One Man, One Woman" tour at which approximately one man and one woman seem to show up for them at each stop. But what NOM lacks in popular, grassroots support, it more than makes up for in...

By the time I graduated from Oak Ridge High School in East Tennessee 34 years ago, I knew a few things for sure:

1. I cared deeply about social justice.
2. I expected to become governor or a senator from Tennessee after college.
3. I was...

There was big news yesterday in California about "the trial of the century." Judge Vaughn Walker today issued a series of questions (see document below) for the parties to the federal Prop. 8 trial that began in January and was put on by Ted Olson and David Boies and colleagues...

Last night, I watched Lt. Dan Choi and Gen. Wesley Clark face off against Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council and Lt. Col. Robert Maginnis on Larry King Live.

The topic was "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT), but the subject at hand was how America deals with...