For 24 years Bob Glaser a successful businessman in the real estate industry lived with his wife and 3 children in the posh South Tampa community known as historic Hyde Park. Five years ago, Bob made a change in his life by revealing his sexuality as a gay man. Bob as his wife have divorced and he has departed from the manicured lawns of the old homes in Hyde Park to live his life as a gay man.
Bob however has not divorced his children and looks forward to celebrating father’s day with them.
Above Bob discusses his ordeal in coming out to his wife and children on this special father’s day.
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(Sept. 26) — Former President Bill Clinton has revealed he recently had a change of heart on the issue of same-sex marriage.
In an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper Friday, Clinton explained that he still believes each state should decide whether to legalize gay marriage, but he is no longer personally opposed to it.
“I think if people want to make commitments that last a lifetime, they ought to be able to do it,” Clinton said.
“I was against the constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage nationwide, and I still think that the American people should be able to play this out in debates,” the former president added. “But me, Bill Clinton personally, I changed my position.”
Asked what caused him to switch his stance, Clinton said he realized his support for other gay-rights issues — such as adoption rights for same-sex couples — didn’t square with his position on marriage.
“I realized that I was over 60 years old. I grew up in a different time … and I was hung up about it,” Clinton said. “I decided I was wrong.”
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A 7-year-old boy always wished his parents were legally married. They finally fulfilled his wish — at his funeral.
Asa Hill died a day after being in a fiery six-vehicle crash Thursday on the Niagara Thruway in upstate New York.
The Associated Press reported that this boy’s parents, Amilcar Hill and Rahwa Ghirmatizion, surprised the hundreds of people who packed the child’s funeral Monday by getting married during the service. They said it had been their son’s wish for a long time.
Amilcar Hill told The Buffalo News Thursday night that he and his family were “hoping for a miracle” but “planning for reality” after rescuers took his critically injured son to Women and Children’s Hospital in Buffalo.
Other victims in the accident included Amilcar Hill’s father and 6-year-old brother. Amilcar’s father, 55-year-old Michael E. Hill of Buffalo, suffered several broken ribs and possibly a collapsed lung. He remains at Eerie County Medical Center.
Amilcar Hill’s brother, Tshanolo Hill, was treated for minor injuries. The two young boys spent a lot of time together, Hill said, so his brother was allowed to visit his son’s bedside.
The Rev. Joel Miller, the Unitarian minister who presided over both the wedding and funeral, said the wedding ceremony honored young Asa Hill’s spirit.
“He was a powerful presence — direct, smart, and had a way of bringing people together,” Miller told CNN.
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We’ve just celebrated the 54th anniversary of the passage of Brown v. Board of Education. The Brown decision overturned Plessy v. Ferguson which gave birth to the separate but equal doctrine.
Although the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the separate but equal doctrine, this country still practice it in the form of civil unions. This practice also runs afoul of the separation of Church and State.
Citing equal protection under the law which is afforded through the 5th and 14th amendment of the U.S. Constitution, Eugene Robinson states in his latest post that it’s time for President Obama to put an end to this practice. Take a read and see if you agree.
MIA ON GAY MARRIAGE
By Eugene Robinson
Friday, May 8, 2009
Believe it or not, often I can see the other side of an argument. I know that tough gun control laws save lives and make our communities safer, for example, but I also see clarity in the Second Amendment. I support affirmative action, but I realize that providing opportunity to some worthy individuals can mean denying opportunity to others. Thinking about some issues involves discerning among subtly graded shades of gray.
On some issues, though, I really don’t see anything but black and white. Among them is the “question” of granting full equal rights to gay and lesbian Americans, which really isn’t a question at all. It’s a long-overdue imperative, one that the nation is finally beginning to acknowledge.
Before his inauguration, President Obama called himself a “fierce advocate of equality for gay and lesbian Americans.” Now, with the same-sex marriage issue percolating in state after state and with the Pentagon’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy ripe for repeal, it’s time for Obama to put some of his political capital where his rhetoric is.
On Wednesday, Maine became the fifth state to legalize gay marriage; similar legislation in New Hampshire has been sent to the governor. Politicians in Washington who want to avoid what they see as a dangerous controversy have a convenient escape: They can say that the marriage issue should be left to the states and that the question of whether a legal gay marriage in one state should be recognized everywhere has already been addressed by Congress and ultimately will be settled by the courts.
But that’s a dodge, not a stance. It certainly can’t be confused with leadership.
Favoring “civil unions” that accord all the rights and benefits of marriage — but that withhold the word marriage, and with it, I guess, society’s approval — amounts to another dodge. I’m concerned here with the way the law sees the relationship, not the way any particular church or religious leader sees it; that’s for worshipers, clergy and the Almighty to work out. Marriage is not just a sacrament but also a contract, and the contractual aspect is a matter of statute, not scripture.
Obama took the “civil unions” route during last year’s campaign and has stuck with it. While I see the political calculation — that was basically the position of all the major Democratic candidates — I never understood the logic. If semantics are the only difference between a civil union and a marriage, why go to the trouble of drawing a distinction? If there are genuine differences that the law should recognize, what are they?
It seems to me that equality means equality, and either you’re for it or you’re not. I believe gay marriage should be legal, and it’s hard for me to imagine how any “fierce advocate of equality” could think otherwise.
Obama sensibly advocates the repeal of “don’t ask, don’t tell.” He should press the case by publicly reminding opponents of letting gays serve openly in the military that their arguments — it would hurt morale, damage cohesion and readiness, discourage reenlistment — are often the same, almost word for word, as the arguments made 60 years ago against racial integration in the armed forces. It was bigotry then, and it’s bigotry now.
Obama should also make the obvious case that forcibly discharging capable, fully trained servicemen and servicewomen for being gay, at a time when our overstretched military is fighting two big wars, can only be described as insane.
What the president shouldn’t do is stay away from the marriage debate on the grounds that it’s not a matter for the federal government. For one thing, he’s on record as favoring repeal of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act — a law that blocked federal recognition of same-sex marriages and relieved states of any obligation to recognize out-of-state gay marriages.
Does Obama’s stance in favor of repeal mean that he believes the federal government should recognize same-sex marriages? Does he also believe that, say, the state of Alabama should recognize a gay marriage performed in Iowa? If so, what is the practical difference between this position and just saying in plain language that gay marriages ought to be legal and recognized in all 50 states?
I’m not being unrealistic. I know that public acceptance of homosexuality in this country is still far from universal. But attitudes have changed dramatically — more than enough for a popular, progressive president to speak loudly and clearly about a matter of fundamental human and civil rights.
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Michael Connolly and his two sons, Jack (foreground) and Duncan, found dead in what authorities describe as murder suicide
Amy Leichtenberg worried this day would come, and she begged the judicial system to prevent it.
In court documents dating back to 2005, she detailed her estranged husband’s threats against her family and fought unsuccessfully to keep him from having unsupervised visits with their two sons. Michael Connolly violated the orders of protection against him six times, police records said, and he often vowed to kill himself rather than be separated from the boys.
Connolly, 40, disappeared with Duncan, 9, and Jack, 7, on March 8, prompting a nationwide search. Their bodies were discovered Sunday near a Christmas tree farm in a remote area of Putnam County.
Police described the deaths as a double homicide and a suicide, but released few details about the killings. The boys’ bodies were found in the back seat of their father’s 1991 Dodge Dynasty, while Connolly’s body was discovered about 60 yards away.
Leichtenberg declined to comment Monday, but she issued a statement lashing out at the judicial system that allowed Connolly unsupervised visits.
A bereathed Amy Leichtenberg sits by her kitchen table in LeRoy, Ill. near photographs of her murdered sons
“No parent should have to bury their babies,” she said. “Duncan and Jack, Mommy loves you to the heavens and back.
“I feel that the judicial system failed me,” she said. “I pray that the courts listen to the warnings from other parents like me.”
Though Connolly and Leichtenberg lived in northwest suburban Algonquin for several years, much of their bitter custody battle took place in LeRoy, a small town near Bloomington where Leichtenberg moved with the boys after ending her marriage. She received orders of protection against Connolly there, including a current order, barring him from contact with her.
Connolly, an unemployed pharmaceutical salesman, violated the order six times but was only charged with four misdemeanors between July 2006 and October 2007, McLean County State’s Atty. William Yoder said. He met with Connolly for an hour a few months ago at Connolly’s request and believed him to be “unbalanced,” Yoder said.
He declined to discuss his office’s specific involvement in the custody battle.
“This was a tragic event,” Yoder said. “This had the worst possible outcome.”
Police began a search for Connolly and the boys three weeks ago when he failed to return them after a scheduled visit. McLean Sheriff Mike Emery conceded there was a delay in the Amber Alert about the abduction, saying the department’s initial attempt did not meet all of the criteria required for the notification. Pressed to discuss the delay, the sheriff said he would not criticize the investigation.
At LeRoy Elementary School, where Duncan was in 3rd grade and Jack was in 2nd, the brothers’ desks had been left untouched since their disappearance. Blue and green ribbons, the boys’ favorite colors, were tied to trees, and parents taped pictures of the missing brothers inside their car windshields.
“In small towns something like this affects the whole town, not just one pocket or one neighborhood,” LeRoy Supt. Gary Tipsord said. “We had prepared for a lot of different outcomes, but I don’t think any of us expected this.”
Putnam County authorities discovered Connolly’s car about 5 p.m. Sunday near a Christmas tree farm about 8 miles south of Hennepin. Police say they do not know of any connection between the family and the secluded site.
Police would not say how long the bodies had been there, if they suffered obvious injuries or whether a weapon was recovered.
Connolly’s aunt, Joyce Connolly, said his family rarely saw him after the couple separated.
“I feel sorry for Michael,” she said. “I know that sounds terrible, but he must have been so tormented.”
Court records and police accounts portray Connolly as an abusive husband who tried to force Leichtenberg to stay in their marriage. He threatened to cut open her and her parents and once told Jack that he would find “a younger, prettier, nicer mama,” according to court documents.
When Connolly sensed Leichtenberg was about to leave him in 2006, she said he pressured her to sign a paper giving him custody of the boys if they divorced. He also demanded his wife make a videotape in which she claimed to abuse her sons, Leichtenberg said. It’s not clear she did either.
“He went into a rage again and told me if I didn’t get home he would kill me. I went home, and he told me if I ever take his boys again he would hunt me down and kill me and my parents and cut us open,” Amy Leichtenberg wrote in her petition for an emergency order of protection in July 2005 in McHenry County Circuit Court.
Neighbors realized something was wrong with the couple’s marriage shortly after they moved into their Algonquin neighborhood in 2003. Friends described Connolly as “controlling” and “manipulative” toward his wife and sons. Leichtenberg often would use neighbors’ telephones to call her parents because her husband didn’t like her speaking with them.
“She could never live a normal life,” former next-door neighbor Jim Gerardi said. “That’s the sad part about it, because he was watching every single move she made.”
While Connolly was out of town on a business trip in 2006, neighbors said they helped Leichtenberg pack her car, and she and the kids sought refuge at a domestic violence shelter.
Leichtenberg filed for divorce in May 2006 in McHenry Circuit Court. In her petition, she described hundreds of harassing phone messages her husband left for her and her family.
In the messages, Connolly outlined stipulations for the divorce: He wanted visitation with his sons alone and one day a week with Amy alone and promised not to hurt them, court documents said.
Leichtenberg withdrew the petition without explanation in December 2006. She returned to the family’s home in Algonquin, but neighbors said she hid inside the house and rarely socialized after the reconciliation.
The couple separated again a short time later, and Leichtenberg moved to LeRoy, where a bitter custody battle ignited. She wrote in court documents in April 2007 that he had called her home and her cell at least 18 times.
In a Tribune interview after the boys disappeared, Leichtenberg said Connolly was granted unsupervised visitation rights in December. She said she begged the McLean judge to deny the request.
“All Michael would do is file his own motions, and the judge was basically tired of him and gave him what he wanted.”
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