Damn (Updated)

It looks like we've lost in Maine.

In a stinging setback for the national gay-rights movement, Maine voters narrowly decided to repeal the state’s new law allowing same-sex marriage.

With 87 percent of precincts reporting early this morning, 53 percent of voters had approved the repeal, ending an expensive and emotional fight that was closely watched around the country as a referendum on the national gay-marriage movement. Polls had suggested a much closer race.

If you lie often enough and loudly enough, you'll win. This is also right at Obama's door -- you remember him, the fierce advocate for the status quo. He avoided every chance to put his weight behind this one, and I, for one, am not going to forget it.

I'm hoping that the State of Maine goes after NOM hammer and tongs on those donor lists -- I'd love to see the looks on those Mainers' faces when they find out they've been voting for the Mormons.

And, if I were in Maine, I'd be working to get another bill on the floor of the legislature ASAP. It's a key part of the anti-gay strategy and it's one we can and should adopt -- keep coming right back until you get what you want.

However, it looks like we're going to be OK in Washington state. Cross your fingers, because it's very early in the count.

Corzine's loss in New Jersey doesn't look good, either. Shelve that one for a while.

Update: Just found this. (Why doesn't NYT cover the Midwest?)

Kalamazoo residents approve nondiscrimination ordinance

"Our campaign started with a very basic idea, and today voters confirmed that we are One Kalamazoo," said Campaign Manager, Jon Hoadley.

With only absentee ballots outstanding, 65 percent of Kalamazoo voters have approved Ordinance 1856 by a vote of 6,463 to 3,527, adding protections for gay and transgender people to the city's nondiscrimination ordinance. This margin is larger than the number of outstanding absentee ballots that are currently being counted.

Update II:

From Gay Buzz:

With a win, our journey is more easy and the path less burdensome. With a loss, we will only regroup and rethink how to move forward on all fronts: civil disobedience, at the ballot box, in the courts and in the media. Nothing ever will stop from being free. I promise you that. So give what you can to Maine by phone calls and money. Prepare yourself for either result. And the fight continues until as Senator Schumer says in the following video that marriage equality is a way of life in all fifty states.

And via that post, this post by David Mixner:

First and foremost, Enough!

We have poured over $100,000,000 in the last two years into efforts where Americans feel it is there obligation to vote on our freedom. The entire concept is repugnant and disgusting. That we for the last three decades have been drawn into this game of 'this is politics' and fighting these ballot box horrors so that maybe by in five, ten or twenty years we will have enough victories to force our federal government to protect our freedom is simply not acceptable anymore. Imagine the good we could have done with all that money. Imagine the civil rights movement we could have built if we had the leadership that was willing to think out of the box and put it on the line.

Second, call this campaign against us what it is - Gay Apartheid.

Refuse to allow any of our fellow Americans, President Obama or our allies to view this as a political issue who time hasn't quite come. America is in the process of creating a system of Gay Apartheid. We will not quietly sit and accept it. All over the place, this nation is creating one set of laws for LGBT Americans and another set for all other Americans. That is the classic definition of Apartheid. Either our political allies are for Gay Apartheid or against it. If they are against it, they must fight with us and no longer duck like President Obama did in Maine and Washington. There is no half way in fighting Apartheid.

Today many will claim that we must surrender the word marriage or accept some sort of separate but equal arrangement. It didn't work in the African-American struggle for freedom and it doesn't work for us. We want full equality with the same rights, benefits and privileges as all other Americans now. We say to those friends, allies and even in our own community who want to accept that second class citizenship, "Oh No You Don't!" We will accept no compromises, time-lines, incremental approaches with our freedom. Don't counsel patience as if this is a new issue. We have been fighting these ballot box bigots for over three decades. Enough.

Third, it is clear that the political establishment in Washington doesn't understand that we no longer willing to wait until it meets their timetable or political needs.

President Obama standing on the sidelines in Maine and Washington was appalling. The failure of our national organizations and leaders to demand his involvement was equally appalling. The outrageous act of the Democratic National Committee sending an email into Maine asking Maine Democrats to call into "NEW JERSEY" instead of to support the fight against bigotry was unbelievable. No one gets to sit on the sidelines in an epic battle against apartheid and no one gets a free pass. If you want our support, you have to earn it. We are way beyond where we will accept a little bit in 2009, some in 2010 and maybe more in the second term. Does anyone think after yesterday election results and the upcoming 2010 election, Obama has the ability to repeal "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" and "DOMA" next year? Does anyone really believe we haven't already missed a historic opportunity in the first 10 months of this year? Only a courageous fighting President and Congress can now help turn us this around and that we have not seen so far. Enough.

And from me, once again -- we're going to keep coming back and back and back until the rest of you wake up.