I would have continued on in blissful ignorance concerning the ‘State of UK Telly Programmes’ but for a recent entry I read online concerning an old standard of British (and American-by-way-of-cable) television, “Doctor Who,” specifically a spinoff called “Torchwood,” which ran originally from 2006 to 2011 and is available on Netflix and other video services.

The series is a paranormal drama along the lines of the “X-Files” of the 1990s, with situations that reflect more modern sensibilities. But what makes it truly modern is that it has as its male lead an openly-bisexual character (“Jack Harkness”) played by an openly gay actor, John Barrowman.

The series is the creation of openly-gay British TV writer/producer Russell Davies, whose other groundbreaking television work includes the original British television version of “Queer As Folk.”

Now, the idea of an openly gay lead in a dramatic (okay, Sci-Fi) series may not seem like such a big deal in these days of “Glee,” “The New Normal,” and days post-“Queer As Folk” and “Will and Grace,” but the fact is, those shows play very much to camp, and if they have opened doors for tolerance and understanding (music and laughs are surely the way into the hearts of most decent folks), they are still very much a far cry from the hair-pulling, chest-thumping romance of man-on-man (I’m not talking porn here) that has been mostly relegated to LoGo, Here!, and the fringe of cable.

In an interview several years ago, Davies noted the Puritan (and Puritanical) cultural influences still being fed to American audiences. “I do watch a lot of television science fiction, and it is a particularly sexless world,” Davies said. “With a lot of the material from America, I think gay, lesbian and bisexual characters are massively underrepresented, especially in science fiction, and I’m just not prepared to put up with that. It’s a very macho, testosterone-driven genre on the whole, very much written by straight men.”

In Britain, Barrowman’s character is described as the “first openly gay” action hero, and as a “hunky bisexual.” Can you imagine that same verbiage being generated by a Hollywood publicist? I’m a gay writer, and I have hard time finding the acuity to break down that mental barrier. It’s just THAT ingrained into us.

Part of the appeal of the Jack Harkness character is that his sexual identity is simply a matter of fact—he doesn’t have an affectation and so people aren’t “affected” by it. There’s no doubt that the widespread acceptance of the show and character relate to changing societal views about what it is to be gay and how society sees gay people. The fact that Jack kisses both a male and female costar on the lips in a nonchalant and natural way makes it easier for an audience to believe it.

My partner and I were at the Florida Renaissance Festival last weekend, and during one of the live stage performances, one of the entertainers made a playful comment about the “gay guys in the audience” that the rest of the crowd took in the stride in which it was meant. But that gap has yet to be bridged on a larger, more mainstream scale. Maybe after these commercial messages.

We have the very real luxury of getting to take for granted living in what is, for the most part, a safe place in which to be an LGBT American. The existence of our little gay burgh—only two squares miles, believe it or not, plus the surrounding zip codes in Victoria Park, Coral Ridge, and further afield in Miami Shores and North Miami—is made even more astonishing when you consider it is surrounded by one of the most ruggedly-individualistic of all Red States, governed by Rick Scott, certainly no Friend of Dorothy he (or even Toto for that matter).

Dean Trantalis, a longtime Wilton Manors-based attorney and longtime Fort Lauderdale resident (who is in a March 12 run-off for that city’s District 2 commission seat) told me a couple of weeks ago that LGBT media outlets are dropping the ball in their coverage of matters of LGBT political importance, including his race against the latest holder of the commission seat, Charlotte Rodstrom (who herself had succeeded Dean; and people think the Gayborhood is a swap-a-thon).

In our defense, I pointed out that this publication had been diligent in our reporting of that race, and of profiling him for our readers as a community leader with a distinguished and laudable pedigree (including activism not least noted for his service in the mid-1990s as co-chair of Americans for Equality, and his work in successfully enacting and defending passage of Broward County’s Human Rights Ordinance, which prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation).

Dean graciously acknowledged our coverage, but as I sit here listening to the poet-singer Paul Simon remind me that “the nearer your destination, the more you’re slip slidin’ away,” it occurs to me that he is right in a much larger sense (Dean, that is, although yes, I guess Paul Simon, is too).

Although we seem to have won numerous “big picture” victories—the end of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT), the President’s refusal to defend the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in court, that egregious law’s “day in court” this spring before the black-robed Supremes, and numerous state house, judicial, and ballot box successes for marriage equality—each of which is justifiably a headline-grabber, the real war is being fought in a way I’m not so sure that we are winning.

In last week’s Agenda, although we covered with pride and (a degree of satisfaction) on the establishment of a legacy to the memory of Tyler Clementi, a victim of ignorance and homophobia (NATION, February 6, 2013: “Rutgers Announces Memorial for Gay Student who Committed Suicide”), in the immediately preceding column, we reported on the tragedy of a 15 year old gay Oregon student who was literally bullied to death (“Bullied Gay 15 Year Old Dies following Suicide Attempt”).

Clearly, no one had made that high school student, Jadin Bell, aware that he was living at the dawn of an “enlightened” age before he chose to hang himself in an elementary school playground.

Jadin Bell didn’t die after a lonely suicide attempt because the House Republican Conference has decided that his rights matter less than those of his straight peers, and have chosen to defend DOMA in court (at least until the coming Supreme Court decisions). But he must have surely found himself living in an atmosphere of fear, uncertainty, and an inability to see himself in a better tomorrow, all of which contributed to that final act of desperation.

I recall House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) making quite an appeal in the interest of Terry Schiavo; does Jadin Bell matter any less to the defenders of tradition, life, and wedded bliss, the GOP?

Here in Florida, State Rep. Joe Saunders, an Orlando Democrat and—with State. Rep. David Richardson (D-Miami Beach)—one of Florida’s first openly gay legislators, introduced the Florida Competitive Workforce Act last week, which would prohibit workplace discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.

It’s not an end in and of itself, but it’s definitely a start.

Often times in the course of writing for and editing a weekly journal that caters to the LGBT community, one finds that it requires the skills of a mountain goat, navigating treacherous paths and risking disaster at many turns.

There is a story about the playwright (and Marilyn Monroe ex-husband) Arthur Miller, whose Pulitzer Prize- and Tony Award-winning play “Death of a Salesman” had just opened on Broadway. Miller was walking around his old Brooklyn neighborhood, when he ran into a hotdog vendor with whom he had attended high school. The vendor asked him, “Artie, how you doing? What you been up to?” Miller told him, “Well, you know, I’m a playwright.” And the hotdog vendor said, “Playwriting, huh? I should’ve gone into that.” Because, you know, it’s just that easy.

Every writer who possesses an ounce of ethics and integrity (and a healthy fear of a just God) knows that each word he puts to page has power, and—in this day and age of online perpetuity—a very real and eternal life of a sort. (Take that, Dracula.)

I had occasion recently to meet a reader at a popular local watering hole. During our conversation, he told me that he had read (and thought well- and fairly-written) coverage in this journal on the ongoing story about Sidelines Sports Bar’s ownership litigation, and plans to move or expand to a second location (January 2, 2013 Agenda). He had also read a story about complaints from some Smart Ride participants who felt they had been bullied—intentionally or otherwise—by members of a competing team (November 21, 2012 Agenda).

In both of these cases, it was understood that some member (or an “angry member,” as the gentlemen who verbally accosted me this morning identified himself) or members of our community would wish that the story hadn’t been written, or may be unhappy with the way in which it was reported. Fair enough.

(Full Disclosure: A former employer of mine “enjoys” the dubious distinction of having his name included on the Forbes list of Longest-Serving White-Collar Prison Sentences; I’m sure there’s a great story waiting to be written that could include my name in the telling of it, were one ignorant of all the facts and context.)

There is not a single one of us, no matter how “good,” or “bad” he may be thought of by his fellows, who doesn’t roll his eyes when his name is spoken out loud or written about in a way that could be construed by someone as unflattering or disrespectful to them, or to their memory.

Several years ago, when I worked at South Florida Gay News, publisher Norm Kent oversaw the investigation of a local man who was presenting himself around town as the owner of a new local magazine, but whose list of unfulfilled promises was almost as long as his list of unpaid employees.

That cover story, “Dirty Larry,” was a hallmark of local journalistic investigation and writing, and it was written with a mandate to learn the truth, in this case because—the publisher’s editorial pointed out—the story’s subject was potentially or actually hurting people in our community.

We’ve always had free press in the U.S., and many of us who are privileged to write for our meager livings have learned to take it for granted.

I know and appreciate that not everyone will find value in a story that casts a friend or loved one in a light that could be viewed by the uninformed or mean-spirited as negative. It is when a writer reports on stories that risk such a reaction that he most wishes he was penning wedding announcements or greeting card niceties, trust me.

At this publication, we are never interested in bringing ridicule upon defenseless persons, nor in reporting about someone’s failures or missteps (except in the case of those accused of defrauding the helpless in our community, in giving an accounting of those accusations: Agenda, April 12, 2012, “Federal Authorities Detail Complaint against Oakland Park man charged in $11 Million Ponzi Scheme: ‘Rainmaker’ alleged to have Bilked Million$ from Wilton Manors Residents;” Agenda, November 14, 2012, “SEC Files Fraud Complaint Against Jim Ellis: Wilton Manors Man Charged with Defrauding Gay Investors”).

You won’t see reported here the failing grades of a business or community leader’s 12-year-old son or about “small” things that don’t even rate as journalism. In this pluralistic society of ours, we have people, on cable TV and on the Internet, who display no appreciation for that kind of finesse, who play fast and loose with the ethics of reporting for-the-record, to say nothing of an appreciation for common human decency. May such a thing never be true of this journal, or of its editor.

I also remember the young man from my days socializing in downtown Fort Lauderdale and seeing him with women going into various clubs that I managed at the time (including Dicey Riley’s, with the late Richard Cimoch). This putatively straight kid, who spends more time at the gym than I have allotted hours for “Walking Dead,” which is no small feat—can often be seen pacing back and forth down his street, speaking on his cellphone, shirtless and deep in conversation.

I have had occasion to see him—actually a lot of occasions—because my paths to and from work often cross those of his home turf, and I therefore have just as many occasions to bear witness to the behaviors of other members of our tribe who happen upon him while he is “peacocking”—displaying himself, strutting—unsuspecting and without the benefit of inoculation that prolonged exposure to the sight of him has bestowed upon me.

I have listened to friends speculate upon the nature and reason for this guy’s posturings. These friends are convinced that he is gay for pay, and at least one “well-informed” local confirms this.

Many of these once-unwary passers-by first encountered him when they turn down his street and—BAM!— glimpsed him texting, or posting to Instagram, or—sometimes—facing the sky, his eyes closed.

What happens next could be the subject of a sociology—or is it anthropology?—paper. I have seen cars literally stop mid-street, bicyclists risk permanent maiming and brain injury when they nearly collide, and pedestrians “stutter-step” into moving traffic because they mischanced to glance his way.

Don’t get me wrong: the guy is handsome (okay, hot), but I’m not going to get killed by a passing Schwinn just to sneak a gander. It wouldn’t be dignified.

Part of living here in the sissified east is that many of us are ignorant of the social niceties of something known as “castle doctrine,” this despite the fact that Florida itself has a Defense of Habitation Law.

Such statutes (also known more cutely as “Go Ahead, Make My Day” Laws) have as their basis the aforementioned Castle Doctrine, a medieval concept  and more recent (in terms of centuries) American legal doctrine that designates a person’s abode (or, in some states, any place that is legally occupied, such as a car or place of work) as a place in which that person enjoys certain immunities and protections, including, under certain circumstances, the use of deadly force to defend against an intruder without becoming liable to prosecution.

Castle doctrine comes from the English common law concept that “a man’s home is his castle,” a view that was established as British law in 1628 and taken to the New World colonies.

(The evocative phrase “Make My Day Law” takes its name from a 1985 Colorado law that grants immunity from criminal charges or civil suits to a person who uses deadly force in the course of defending against a home invasion. The nickname itself is hommage to Clint Eastwood’s Dirty Harry. Law imitates “art:” Be very afraid.)

It’s easy to forget that such considerations exist outside the quite confines of our Gayborhood, or from the suburban-esque security of burgs like Victoria Park and other gentrified-by-gays sections of Broward County. But the outside world reared its ugly head a few nights ago when my partner and I and another couple were taking the night air on Wilton Drive.

As we were passing Jaycee Park—which was most recently the home of the city’s holiday Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa display)—I saw a youngish African American lady talking on her cell phone, a pre-adolescent boy bringing up her rear close behind.

Being the son of a single mother (and, of course, I have no reason to know if in fact this woman was a single parent, but my right brain was driving here) I usually try to have a smile for kids who (I think) are in circumstances similar to my own while I was growing up.

But as I prepared to dole out my Mary Poppins Best, the waif gestured at us in what could—in other circumstances—have been interpreted in a comedic way, if the message hadn’t been so clearly and viciously homophobic: he placed his hands in such a way as to mimic “blinders” so as to avoid seeing us holding hands and otherwise engaged in ‘couples’ behavior.

The emotions that passed among us ranged from blissful ignorance to polite indifference to DEFCON 1 preparedness. This last was most demonstrably evinced by one of our friends (who is of the dangerous-when-provoked-variety), and who was on the verge of giving the lad a mindful/mouthful combo when he was talked back from the ledge by his boyfriend (which is of the attorney-variety).

The outrage put me in mind for some reason of the provocative scene in the 1995 film “Die Hard with a Vengeance” in which Bruce Willis’ character is compelled by terrorists to wear a sandwich board in the streets of Harlem, New York, bearing the message “I Hate N******”—a word that is offensive in a way to which neither “faggot” nor “queer” measure up.

Happy (Proud? Relieved?) as I am to report that I was in no way prompted to rain that particular—and particularly loathsome—sobriquet upon the kid’s head (which would make me the story here), it shocked me that he and his mom were clearly “okay” enough meandering the nighttime streets of the Gayborhood, but not on a level in which “junior” would feel remotely remorseful about behaving so badly in someone else’s “castle.” As Tony Soprano might say, “They’ll let that kid say anything.”

On some Reptilian Brain level, I suppose I was strengthened by the knowledge that I was on my home turf—which gave me territoriality to add to my righteous indignation and moral outrage (what my mother might call “the high ground”). What right, quoth the Reptile, do these people have to put us on the defensive in “my house?”

I realized that being a gay man made it difficult for me to invoke, in the words of the philosopher John Rawls, a “veil of ignorance” and judge the situation on its “merits” rather than through the impulse of emotion. What was doubly ironic about the timing was that, just a few minutes later, we walked past The Manor and saw that it was hosting a predominantly African-American event in its nightclub. Progress has its small victories.

The election cycle of 2012 taught us that LGBT rights is a “winner” on the national agenda, and that in a meaningful way we have “won” the bigger conversation. Now we just need to translate that to weeknights on Wilton Drive.

Research in neuroscience has found that while all the three sections of your brain—“new brain,” “middle brain,” and “reptilian brain”—communicate with each other, it is the reptilian brain that is—in the words of George W. Bush—“the Decider.”

Whereas the “new brain” thinks (processing rational data and sharing deductions with the other two brains), and the “middle brain” feels (processing emotions and “gut feelings” and also sharing its “discoveries” with the other two), the “reptilian brain” takes data from the others but retains the final decision making for itself.

It seems funny that the oldest and least adaptable part of your brain would be responsible for making the final call about such consequential matters as when to befriend a person, when to kick the crap out of them, or when to screw their brains out.

There is something of a “collective” reptilian brain, too, I think, one that is shared by the members of a culture, which can have a difficult time changing prevailing (and therefore comforting) attitudes. One example happened when the iconic television sitcom “I Dream of Jeannie” made its premiere in 1965.

As you undoubtedly know, the series (which ran with new episodes until 1970) starred Barbara Eden as a 2,000-year-old genie who is discovered by an astronaut (Larry Hagman), who in turn becomes her new master. As the series continued, “Jeannie” falls in love with “Master” and eventually marries him.

“Jeannie,” which ran on NBC, was created in response to the enormous success of “Bewitched,” which had debuted in 1964 on rival network ABC as the second-most-watched program in the U.S. “Bewitched,” of course, starred Elizabeth Montgomery in a sitcom about a witch who marries a mortal and tries to live as a normal suburban housewife.

Although both series were produced by Screen Gems (in a clever move to capture both sides of the “magic market”), the messages of the two programs couldn’t have been more different.

“Bewitched”—representing the more “modern” worldview—portrayed a strong female character (“Samantha Stevens”) who “chooses” to forsake her magical powers in order to live a normal life (over the strong objections of her “traditional” family).  Although devious elements are constantly trying to destroy their bliss, Samantha and her husband inevitably overcome these forces, most often represented by Samantha’s mother, Endora. But these obstacles fall before Samantha’s strength of purpose, and even the antagonistic mother-in-law admits that the fact that her despised son-in-law “loves my daughter” is stronger magic than her disruptive hexes.

That may have been all well and good for the “middle brain”-dominant crowd of the mid-60s, but the “reptile” was alive and well across town at “Jeannie,” where the uniform of the day was ‘harem girl chic’ and where the inference was pretty clear: for every “master,” a slave.

Apparently even the “traditional” programming execs at Screen Gems weren’t convinced that the “enlightened” audiences of the day could take the show’s premise for long: In the book “Dreaming of Jeannie,” the story is told of how producer Sidney Sheldon wanted to film the program’s first season in color, but NBC wouldn’t pay for the added $400 per episode expense, since neither they nor Screen Gems thought the show would make it to a second season.

It’s enjoyable to poke fun at the prevailing attitudes of an earlier, less “forward thinking” time from the safety of our “enlightened” 21^st Century perches. And while both “Bewitched” and “I Dream of Jeannie” will always hold a sentimental place in the hearts of people “of a certain age,” we might also take away from this reminiscence the knowledge that stereotypes, prejudices, and the “caveman” perspective don’t need any help from us to stay alive and kicking.

They have your reptile brain for that.

There is a tendency among some to invoke the memory of Ancient Rome when they are looking for historical antecedents to help them define some moral point or other about the decline of Western—and more specifically, American—values. I would offer that ‘these people’—in today’s culture, mostly religious conservatives, nationalist-types, and fringe prophesy theorists—fail to grasp the very history they want to conjure.

Most of the moral decay (including no doubt the “perversion” of homosexuality) that keeps them up nights pre-dates Imperial—and even Republican—Rome and probably goes back to that naughty night when Ooglook the Neanderthal and Yammoo the Cro-Magnon decided to invent “getting your freak on.”

More than the Decline of the Roman Empire, America at the dawn of the Third Millennium closely parallels Tudor England, that “Merrie Olde Tyme” so charmingly brought to life in Renaissance fairs across the planet (there’s one coming up in Deerfield Beach next month), which ran its course for roughly the century beginning just before 1500 and ending just after 1600.

As well as giving us the cultural legacy of fat King Henry VIII and the beginnings of many modern popular entertainment forms, the Tudor century also defined much of the morality (I am fighting the urge to say “priggishness” and “sexual hypocrisy”) that would inform the birth of Puritanism and later—in a very real, meaningful, and in some instances tragic fashion— the American Experiment.

Like America in recent years, the world of Tudor England was one where the rich got richer and the poor got both poorer and more numerous. (In a modern illustration, in the year I was born the U.S. population was roughly 180 million; fast forward 48 years and that number has nearly doubled, to about 310 million.)

Like the government of Henry VIII and his children Edward VI (from “Prince and the Pauper” fame), Mary I (recall her when you consume your next Bloody Mary), and Elizabeth I (memorably portrayed on the big screen by Bette Davis, Judy Dench, and Cate Blanchett), managing the seriously poor has become a preoccupation of successive presidencies since roughly the dawn of the 20th Century (when Theodore Roosevelt first drew attention

To be an LGBT Hero doesn’t require that one actually be Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, or Transgender (or Questioning or Intersex, for that matter); it demands a willingness to fight for the same equality enjoyed by all members of the human family.

These individuals did just that—and all, coincidentally, fulfill both criteria of being LGBT AND a Hero.

R.I.P. Sally Ride: Woman of Space and Science

America’s first woman in space, astronaut Sally Ride lived quietly for 27 years with her partner, Dr. Tam O’Shaughnessy. Although she had married fellow astronaut Steven Hawley in 1982, the two divorced five years later, and when she died of pancreatic cancer in July, the self-written obituary for the 61 year old space pioneer and physicist (an entry which only mentioned “her partner of 27 years” in passing) was the instrument of her personal outing.

The author—some with O’Shaughnessy—of seven children’s books about science, Ride championed the cause of inspiring American youths to pursue careers in math, science, engineering, and technology. She also helped to establish the GRAIL MoonKAM program, which allows children around the world to take pictures of the lunar surface, using a NASA satellite that is currently in orbit around the moon.

After her posthumous coming out, Ride’s sister offered, “Sally didn’t use labels. Sally had a very fundamental sense of privacy, it was just her nature.”

Gen. Tammy Smith: An Army of One

Brig. Gen. Tammy Smith, United States Army Reserve (USAR), is not “just” the first openly-gay flag officer to come out while serving in the U.S. military: She is also the first married gay general officer (her wife, Tracey Hepner, co-founded and directs the Military Partners and Families Coalition, an organization that serves the same-sex partners of military servicemembers and veterans).

Smith—who holds a Master in Strategic Studies degree from the U.S. Army War College, among other academic credentials, including a doctorate—received her general’s star on August 10, in a private ceremony held at Arlington National Cemetery, the same day she came out.

In her promotion speech, the Afghanistan War veteran spoke about “standing on the shoulders of giants” and saluted the military women (“firsts,” she called them) who preceded her, and who had “broken glass ceilings, but got scratched in the process.”

Nate Silver: A Beautifully-Ordered Mind

Last month, 34 year old Nate Silver earned his place among the pantheon of notable political analysts in American history, correctly predicting the winner in the presidential match between President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

In 31 out of 33 U.S. Senate races, Silver’s predictions came true (with exceptions Montana and North Dakota, in which he forecasted twin Republican victories; both went to the Democrats).

This gay power-wonk (statistician being the “least” of his cryptic-sounding disciplines, which include expertise as both a sabermetrician and psephologist) first gained notice for developing a system for predicting the performance and career development of Major League Baseball players.

In 2009, Silver was named one of “The World’s 100 Most Influential People” by Time.

Silver’s sexual identity became the subject of salacious—and irrelevant—ad hominem attacks during this year’s election cycle, when pollster Dean Chambers of UnSkewedPolls referred to him as “a man of very small stature,” and “a thin and effeminate man with a soft-sounding voice.”

Refusing to rise to Chambers’ bait, or lower himself to that level, Silver tweeted, “Unskewedpolls argument: Nate Silver seems kinda gay + ??? = Romney landslide!”

He ends 2012 most assuredly with a bang. His book, “The Signal and the Noise,” published in September, reached The New York Times bestseller list for nonfiction, and was named the Best Nonfiction Book of 2012 by Amazon.

Duncan Hosie: Challenging the “Supreme” Right

Is it every Ivy League student’s dream to one day address the U.S. Supreme Court? Just a month after coming out, Princeton University student Duncan Hosie got his own personal day in “court” (of a sort) when he called to the carpet no less august a personage than Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, and took him to task for remarks the jurist had made equating same-sex marriage with bestiality and murder.

As we previously reported (Florida Agenda, December 12, 2012: “At Princeton, Scalia Grilled about Questionable Gay Remarks”), the December 10 exchange occurred following a lecture Scalia gave to promote his new book, “Reading Law.”

Hosie confronted the 76 year old Scalia—the longest-serving justice on the current high court—whose glib reply (“If we cannot have moral feelings against homosexuality, can we have it against murder? Can we have it against other things?”) merely served to stoke the embers of Hosie’s righteous outrage.

“I think his response was absurd in many aspects,” Hosie offered MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell. Case closed.

Thomas “Bozzy” Bosworth: Fair Play, On and Off the Field

You might never have heard of 18 year old Thomas “Bozzy” Bosworth if he hadn’t exhibited a measure of courage and grace that is to be found missing in adults twice—three times—his age. The teenage rugby player from Wales (UK) devised his own personal effort to fight homophobia in sports, posting a lengthy Facebook entry about his own experience coming out to his family and his teammates.

“To clear all the gossip up and shit that has been going around about me,” Bosworth wrote. “Yes I am gay and I never choose this and it’s the hardest thing [I’ve] ever had to deal with in my life.”

Courage, grace, persistence, and self-awareness: A champion like Bosworth exhibits all of these.

Cheryl Chow: Seattle’s Best

“Parents and kids: don’t be afraid of saying that you’re gay. I was afraid for over 60 years and those 60 years were wasted.” With those heart-wrenching words, former Seattle City Councilwoman Cheryl Chow, who is dying of brain cancer, came out.

The 66 year old former educator and said she remained closeted for decades because she feared the reaction of her family, and in particular her mother, restaurant owner and elected official Ruby Chow.

Chow said that although her mother was one of Seattle’s first restaurateurs to welcome a gay clientele, “that didn’t mean that she wanted me to be gay.”

“You don’t sh** where you eat, and you definitely don’t sh** where I eat.” Tony Soprano

Welcome to the relaunch issue of the Florida Agenda. We hope you like and find value in the improvements we have made to both this journal and its sister publication, Guy Magazine. Thank you for your past and ongoing support, patronage, and honest criticisms, all of which have helped make this publication a community newspaper through and through.

Walking through the Gayborhood, you will notice the presence of small signs (perhaps too small) posted in retail and other windows enjoining you to spend your money locally this holiday season. It’s a worthy message, and one that Multimedia Platforms (the publisher of the Agenda and Guy) encourages you to put into practice as we close the remaining days of 2012—Mayan apocalypse predictions notwithstanding—prior to the end of Hanukkah (which runs through December 16), Kwanzaa (December 26 to January 1), and Christmas (you know this one).

In this modern age of convenience, there are plenty of options available to a savvy shopper, and as the economy remains tepid, it is natural and smart to be discriminating with your hard-earned dollars.

Last week, my partner and I attended the Wilton Manors Holiday Tree Lighting Ceremony. As the musical ensemble on stage played their hearts out, our friend, Krishan Manners came up to us and said—perennially-impish grin in place, and without a hint of irony, “Welcome to small-town living.” And wouldn’t you know we were standing on the city’s main street, Wilton Drive.

That ideal—and idyll—of a community built upon a foundation that includes gay gentrification is precisely the “promise” of Greater Fort Lauderdale’s gay ghetto (or ‘village,’ if your sensibilities prefer) to so many people around the country and the world who dream of living, working, and playing in a spot just like this.

We do our parts by ensuring that this Gayborhood—a goose responsible for laying so many golden eggs—is properly nourished, fed, watered and cared for; in short, sustained through the economic power that makes LGBT consumers the envy of every demographic and the target of every brand and commodity.

A recent survey for Shop.org found that shoppers on Cyber Monday spent an average $194.46 online, which was more than the average person spent online over the (Thanksgiving) weekend just preceding it ($172.42).

Don’t misunderstand me: in my house, we love us some eBay (and Amazon), but imagine the economic—and quality of life—impact to our community if that $366.88 four-day spending average had been spent in the Shoppes of Wilton Manors, or at Strawberry Plaza (home of Matty’s on the Drive and other establishments), or in To The Moon Marketplace, Out of the Closet, The Outlet, Island City Eyecare, LeatherWerks, 4 Men Clothing, Tropics, Tropixxx, or any of dozens of other local merchants who create jobs and a tax base for our community, our city, and our county. It builds the foundation for more gay—and yes, even some not-so-gay—men and women to build their lives here in this place we call paradise and home.

In the 13 shopping days remaining until Christmas (and the eight left until my birthday), take a moment and consider how much of your remaining shopping—and spending—can be done with merchants and venues where that money is best likely to make a positive impact in your own back yard (and preferably those where, even if the owners or management aren’t precisely a “mom” or a “pop,” you can be pretty sure that they at least have one).

Taking your money out of the local economy sends a message that you don’t support local businesses and local jobs.

By spending here, with the people in your Gayborhood, you likewise display front and center your willingness to serve as a steward for the greater community, since shopping local means saving gas and wear and tear to your car—and the environment (putting the “green” back into the season, in a meaningful way).

In this case, size doesn’t matter: large purchases, small purchases, gift cards—the world’s best shopping district outside of Naples, Italy is to be found right here on our doorsteps.

During the holidays and at every time of the year, home is what we make of it.

On Monday, December 17, Barack Obama will be officially elected President of the United States (I hope), when the Electoral College meets to approve the popular ballot results of the voters “in their several states.”

In the decades since I first came to understand the import of the Electors and their role in preserving the mandate of both the majority and the wishes of the minority, I came to realize how relevant it remains (despite centuries of criticism), as well as how much it is a pillar of a system that—eventually—will provide full rights for all American citizens.

I’m going to endeavor to render a non-sleep-making primer on the history and purpose of the Electoral College (a sort of “Schoolhouse Rock” for the Reality-TV Generation).

In 1787, an influential group of the Founders pushed through a plan whereby a body of “electors” apportioned among the states (in the same numbers as their congressional representatives—under a formula that resulted in, among other things, the vile Three-fifths compromise of counting “portions” of slaves for congressional representation), chosen by each state “in such manner as its Legislature may direct,” would select the President.

In addition to the slave-holding states, the Electoral College was popular with the smaller states, rising out of their concerns that large population states (think modern California, New York, Texas, and Florida) would determine the results of Presidential elections.

In the context of 21^st Century Presidential politics, the Electoral College is often seen as an anachronistic, undemocratic means of choosing a Chief Executive (since it is the electors who actually do the electing of the President, rather than the people)—one that should be replaced through popular vote choice of the winner. I beg to disagree.

The state parties choose a slate of electors they trust will vote for the party’s nominee. Almost every state awards its electoral votes to the state’s popular vote winner. The formula for each state’s electors is based on two senators and two Electoral College votes for each state, with additional electoral votes for each state based on population.

Based on this formula, it’s possible—as happened in 2000, when Bush had fewer popular votes than Gore, but more electoral votes—that the winner of the popular vote does not win the electoral vote. But this is a rarity in American politics; before 2000, that balance was last disturbed in 1888.

Despite the hyperbole of both major parties, “landslide” is a word that isn’t often heard with respect to American Presidential elections, in which most races are closely decided.

An analysis of every Presidential election since 1980 (which saw the election of Ronald Reagan and what is likely the last major political realignment, prior to Obama’s re-election and the birth of what might be a Neo-Progressive Era (which includes state marriage equality wins, legalization of marijuana, and a cultural shift in attitudes towards immigration and immigrants) shows that in each of the last eight Presidential races, only one (1984) represented a “landslide” victory (as it is usually defined by a 10-point or greater margin of victory).

But back to the Electoral College and the reasons for its continued necessity in a modern context. Unlike the popular vote, which, as in 2000, can reflect a too-close-too-call outcome, the winning Presidential candidate’s share of Electoral College votes is larger than his share of the popular vote. (Example: Obama received 51.3 percent of the popular vote, but should receive 61.7 percent of the Electoral Vote on December 17.)

If the Electoral College were eliminated, any “close call” race would be a temptation to the loser to request a recount, creating the possibility of a Constitutional crisis, as nearly happened in 2000 over Florida’s disputed votes, with party lawyers going state-by-state and creating a climate of paralysis, conflict, and crisis (just imagine Florida 2000 by an exponential of 50-plus-the District of Columbia).

The existence of the Electoral College likewise requires that the presidential nominees to campaign across the country, rather than in large population areas. It means that—as was seen this year, again in Florida—the power of constituent groups campaigning like hell shifted the balance from “likely” Romney to “thankfully” Obama (sorry, Republicans).

It means that the huge local outpouring of pro-Obama support made an enormous difference, one that is reflected in Obama’s 29 electoral vote win from the Sunshine State.

Like it or not, the Electoral College means that Obama is every Americans’ president. Or at least, a boy can hope.