Gay World News Roundup

A lot has happened this week on the world-wide political scene, and for those who've missed them, here's what happened, with critique and comment by My Small Gay World:

U.K. - Tony Blair Resigns
Announced a few months ago that after ten years as Prime Minister, Tony Blair officially stepped down this week. What's really queer is that despite being best buds with gay-hating president Bush, Tony-baby has been very supportive of gays in England, and in March he became the first British Prime Minister to address an LGBT civil rights group, telling Stonewall that the partnership law gave him "real joy". He said when the first set of ceremonies took place he did "a little skip" in celebration." Skip on, Tony, we'll miss you!

Russia - Gay Hating Mayor Yuri Luzhkov Re-Elected
Luzhkov-the-Terrible was re-elected to his fifth term as mayor of Moscow, just as police dispersed a small group of LGBT activists protesting against Luzhkov in front of the European Union office in Moscow. About two dozen gays were demanding that the EU impose a visa ban on the mayor over his opposition to LGBT rights. Luzhkov's re-election does not bode well for our gay brothers and sisters in Moscow. Hang in their you guys of All of Russia, we're rooting for you!

USA - Bush Plans to Veto Washington DC Budget Due to DP Registry
President Bush says he'll veto budget appropriations for the District of Columbia unless the measure contains language barring the district from using any of the money for its domestic partner registry. For those who may not be aware, the USA's Capital is listed as a "state," but as the seat of the Federal Government, is really a "Federal District," and lacks many of the autonomies and privileges that the States have, and many of its laws and budgets are at the discretion of Congress and the President.

Well, because of this, Bush can use his veto power over the Democratically passed D.C. budget, which included monies for Washington's Domestic Partner Registry, citing that "under Federal law, legal marriage is the union between a man and a woman. Federal tax dollars are not used to extend employment benefits to domestic partners of Federal employees, and D.C. should not enjoy an exception to this rule." Domestic Partnerships are not marriage, but it would take a president with an actual IQ to be able to figure that out. Gosh, 2008 can't come soon enough!

Canadian Anglicans Back-Track on Blessing Same Sex Marriages/Unions
We were all holding our breaths, but The Anglican Church of Canada let us down, and delegates voting Sunday at the General Synod rejected the idea of letting individual dioceses decide whether their priests could perform blessing ceremonies for same sex couples who were married in civil ceremonies.

However, the General Synod did agree that same sex blessings do not conflict with its core doctrine, a decision that paves the way for the practice. Two steps forward, one step back.