This is a bit of a surprise. In a move that buys time before the ultimate reckoning from the Supreme Court, the proponents of Proposition 8 asked for an en banc re-hearing of their case before the full Ninth Circuit. This will add a step to the legal outcome of Prop 8, which a three-judge panel on the Ninth Circuit just ruled in violation of federal law.

Supporters of Proposition 8, the California initiative banning marriage equality, which was declared unconstitutional by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals yesterday, plan to take their fight directly to the Supreme Court, if their reaction to yesterday’s ruling is accurate. Their statements trashed the Ninth Circuit and said they always believed the issue should be settled by the Supreme Court.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals found California’s Proposition 8 unconstitutional this morning, relying on arguments used by Supreme Court Justice Kennedy in another case. This furthers a process that will almost certainly end in the Supreme Court, with a precedent-setting ruling on the right of same-sex couples to marry. However, the ruling today is limited to the circumstances of the California initiative.

Andrew Sullivan attempts to mount a defense of President Obama’s record from the standpoint of achieving liberal objectives. But on some key items, he gets the President’s record and positions wrong, even backwards.

Minnesota’s gay community, in the person of John Medeiros, has officially apologized to Amy Koch, Republican state senator and former Majority Leader in the Minnesota state senate, for causing her to ruin her own marriage by straying with a staffer widely rumored by insiders to be Michael Brodkorb.

The correct term for the struggle same-sex couples are fighting for, the recognition of their intimate unions by the state on the same terms, entirely, of the relationships of opposite-sex couples is “Marriage Equality.” There’s actually no such thing as “Gay Marriage,” which is the preferred term of American homobigots, sometimes accompanied by the disparaging prefix so-called.

Even in the Era of New Dysfunction, Congress usually manages to pass a defense authorization bill. The forces of nature demand that the war machine gets to set its budgets on time, even if the budgets for food stamps, welfare, the NIH, the Department of Education, etc., have to sit on pins and needles and [...]

Academy Award winning screenwriter Dustin Lance Black’s play 8 covering the Proposition 8 hearings starring Morgan Freeman, Anthony Edwards, Cheyenne Jackson, Christine Lahti, Rob Reiner, Yeardley Smith and Marisa Tomei hits Broadway on September 19 in a one-time staged reading at the Eugene O’Neil Theater to benefit the American Foundation for Equal Rights. Tickets start at $500.

The courts are following the evolving determinations of one of the litigants in the case. If repeal has passed and is about to be certified, and if the same Administration is withdrawing their support for laws discriminating against same-sex couples on the grounds that they are unconstitutional, the court had no choice but to lift the stay. “The circumstances and balance of hardships have changed,” wrote the Ninth Circuit, “and [the government] can no longer satisfy the demanding standard for issuance of a stay.”

For the past week, the eyes of the gay rights community have been on Albany, where lawmakers in New York State have been close to finalizing a marriage equality bill. This would make New York the 6th, and easily the largest, state to allow same-sex couples to marry.