You've probably heard that Rob Reiner's been in San Francisco federal court to watch the unfolding of Perry v. Schwarzenegger, otherwise known as the Prop 8 trial. What's he doing there?
Contemplating a movie? Maybe. I mean, I hope so. And I hope it stars Jodie Foster and John Lithgow — you know, the guy who played the latest serial killer beside Dexter. He'd say, "Hate the sin, love the sinner!" like nobody's business!
Here's to hoping.
But let's forget about that for now. According to the CBS News report below, Reiner is "financing much of the legal defense on the gay side."
And that's not all.
Reiner, a liberal whose financial aid was a big secret when the suit was announced, is also the man responsible for recruiting conservative Ted Olson to the legal team. Not one to shy away from politics (it's rumored that he's always considering a run for governor of CA) Reiner saw the legal effort with Olson as "an opportunity to basically say this is not a partisan issue. This is not republican, this is not democrat, this is not conservative or liberal. This is about equal justice and equal rights for everybody in this country, and that the Constitution provides for that."
He's right, of course.
Bruce Cohen, one of the producers of the Oscar-winning film "Milk" knows he's right and joined Reiner's leadership team once he found out that Ted Olson was part of the group. "Once we heard that," Cohen says, "we realized that this is the time to bring this case to courts to try to overturn Prop 8 on a federal level."
The report also mentions how this new leadership made it very clear it didn't want anything to do with the old GLBT leadership. Cleve Jones, who's made quite a comeback in the past year, says that the Reiner/Olson combo doesn't only mark a change in leadership, but also a change in strategy. "People all across the country have been made increasingly impatient by the county by county, city by city, state by state struggle for fractions of equality."
Some in the GLBT community think that throwing everything into a federal ring now is a risky move. But, if today's court proceedings are any indication of the things to come — if we see more evidence of powerful churches intentionally working behind the scenes to disguise their involvement in the public realm — then I say, Bring it on! As I repeated over and over again today as I Tweeted about the trial, it's time to name names; it's time to expose the bigotry on a level that's best equipped to quash it.
I won't get fooled again. But, more important, I don't want to make it easy for anyone else to get fooled again.
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