by Rex Wockner
[story filed August 29, 2005]
SAN DIEGO --
More than 200 hard-core Democratic GLBT activists from 27
states huddled
here Aug. 25-28 at the National Stonewall Democrats 2005
Organizing Convention.
"We still have
so much to do," said lesbian California Sen. Christine
Kehoe, D-San
Diego. "The conservatives and the religious right are a
strong force
with generous resources and they will fight us every step
of the way.
They'll use their money, their political hold they have over
supposed Republican
moderates like John McCain, and their ties to big
business and
to numerous right-wing think tanks. They will say our equal
rights are special
rights."
In an interview,
Kehoe said the Stonewall Democrats are about "strategic
organizing,
articulating a message and getting GLBT Americans to vote
and to be active."
"This organization
is for the person who is going to give hours and
hours to a local
campaign, who's gonna raise money, write checks, go to
meeting after
meeting," she said. "These are the shock troops that go
out and raise
the interest of the average voter."
Stonewall Democrats
Executive Director Eric Stern said the organization
finds itself
at a key juncture.
"It's a critical
time to be working within the party because, quite
honestly, in
a number of states I think there is a resistance by state
party chairs
to involve our community in party activities," he said. "We
play the role
of effectuating change within the party. ... We need to
remind the state
party chairs around the country that we provide the
volunteer energy,
we provide the finances, we provide the staff, the
ideas, the creativity
to so many winning campaigns -- and unless we are
given a nicer
welcome mat, then there's no reason for us to support
state parties."
But State Sen.
Liz Figueroa, D-Fremont, who is running for lieutenant
governor, said
the Stonewall Dems need to refine their message.
"A national organization
like this needs to speak from one voice, have
one clear message
that is simple to deliver and brings in nongay
legislators
like myself so that we, holding hands, can deliver an easy
message that
everybody feels good about," she said in an interview.
"Right now,
we're splintering each other. It would be much more powerful
to have one
clear message.
"For me, it's
human rights," Figueroa said. "How many people that I know
pride themselves
that they were associated with the civil-rights
movement? Well,
this is a civil-rights movement! People will look down
in the history
books and, I really, truly believe, regret that they
weren't part
of this incredible movement right now. We have not
communicated
it clearly enough for people to say they really want to be
part of it."
In a lunchtime
speech, Figueroa promised delegates she will "go up and
down the state,
speaking in Spanish, speaking to other grandmothers,
speaking to
católicos, speaking to anybody I have to about marriage
equality, human
dignity, human compassion and love."
Gay Palm Springs
Mayor Ron Oden said Stonewall also must maintain its
focus on electing
open gays to public office.
"The greatest
thing that we're going to do is to continue working on
making sure
that we get openly gay and lesbian candidates elected," he
said in an interview.
"Also, the coalition that we're building to
support our
marriage-equality initiative and to make sure that our
issues continue
to stay in the front line of Democratic equality
issues."
San Diego City
Councilwoman and mayoral candidate Donna Frye told
delegates they
need to "make sure that there's someone there [in office]
that's an advocate
and that will speak up for you and will do the right
thing even when
there's nobody watching, and then make sure that the
things that
are being done behind closed doors, that you should see --
that those doors
are kicked right back open."
"When I first
ran for my City Council seat in January of 2001," she
said, "there
were a lot of hot-button issues, and probably none hotter
than the Boy
Scouts."
Gay activists,
atheists and the American Civil Liberties Union were
suing to cancel
the Boy Scouts' sweetheart lease on land in the city's
Balboa Park
because of their ban on gays and atheists.
"It turned out
to be extremely controversial," Frye said. "The amount of
negative campaigning
and nasty comments, the extremely inflammatory --
and I mean inflammatory
-- campaign ads that went out in our community
-- one of them
was a picture of a Boy Scout, and it was a crying Boy
Scout, he was
weeping, and then there was a picture of a happy Boy
Scout, and he
was smiling. The crying Boy Scout was crying because of
Donna Frye.
I made the Boy Scout cry! Because standing up for God and
your country
wasn't good enough for Donna Frye."