A dear friend of mine, Tara, who is likely best known for her herculean efforts founding and running 'The Tara Foundation Org' has relocated her personal web site.  Tara has been a vital member of the transgender community long before I even understood what gender was.

 

Her site is rich with information about transitioning and she also offers a glimpse into her biography as well as her sense of humor!

 

Good luck with the new digs Tara!! 

 

Here's the URL...

 

PHOENIX | The former city manager of Largo, who was fired earlier this
year when his sex change plans were made public, reportedly has
applied for the city manager's job in the Phoenix suburb of Tempe.

Susan Stanton, 48, was known as Steve Stanton throughout her 14-year
tenure as Largo's manager.

The Largo City Commission voted 5-2 in February and again in March to
fire Stanton from the $140,000-a-year job.

Commissioners said it was Stanton's judgment, not the sex change
revelation, that prompted the votes.

Tempe officials wouldn't confirm Wednesday that Stanton is one of 23
people applying for the city manager's job because they aren't
disclosing any names except the finalists. But several City Hall
officials confirmed the application to The Arizona Republic.

Tempe is among only three Arizona cities that protect transgender
people with a nondiscrimination policy.

That's probably one of the reasons Stanton applied, said Tempe
Diversity Manager Rose Inchausti, who said she heard about Stanton's
plans through a community member.

The city will start choosing the finalists Monday.
 

The fired city manager becomes a presidential campaign issue, then
appears on Larry King Live.

However briefly, the firing of Susan Stanton as Largo's city manager
has become a campaign issue.

A presidential campaign issue.

Last week, Sen. John Edwards was asked about Susan Stanton at a
Democratic presidential candidate's forum on gay and transgender
issues Thursday.

With Stanton, 48, sitting in the audience in Los Angeles, a
questioner told Edwards that Stanton was fired as Largo's city
manager after news of her transition was made public.

Edwards was then asked how he would react if a member of his staff
told him he or she was transgendered.

"I would support them in every possible way including on a personal
and emotional level, provide every bit of help and support that I
possibly could in going through what they were going through," he
said.

Edwards also said Stanton's situation shows "we need powerful
nondiscrimination laws in the United States of America so that
people cannot be fired."

Stanton said other major presidential candidates also remarked that
workers should not be fired because they're gay or transgendered.

"It seemed like a no-brainer to people who were answering that
question," Stanton said.

Steve Stanton, Largo's city manager for 14 years, was fired in
March, about a month after disclosing his plans to undergo gender
reassignment surgery.

City commissioners who voted to fire Stanton said gender had nothing
to do with their decision. Rather, they said that as city manager
Stanton had been a demanding and sometimes intolerant boss who was
asking for more leniency than he gave to subordinates.

After his termination, Stanton had his name legally changed to Susan
Ashley Stanton.

Edwards' remarks about Stanton were highlighted during a Friday
night segment of Larry King Live featuring Stanton and three other
transgender people.

During the show, Stanton told King she has scheduled sexual
reassignment surgery. Stanton, who started living as a woman three
months ago, plans to have surgery next May, Stanton said Monday.

She moved to Sarasota in July and has applied for several jobs in
recent weeks, including administrative positions at the University
of South Florida and a deputy city manager job in Berkeley, Calif.

Despite Edwards' support, Stanton said she favors one of his rivals
in the race for president.

Hillary Clinton, she said, "has such an assertive style, and I like
her positions on many things."

A registered Republican, Stanton said she hasn't voted with the GOP
for 15 years.

Asked about her party affiliation, Stanton said, "I probably ought
to at some point change that."

Five years ago today at the same Southeast DC intersection where
transsistah Tyra Hunter was involved in the fateful auto accident
that took her life, two transsistahs named Stephanie Thomas and Ukea
Davis were brutally murdered.

19 year old Stephanie and 18 year old Ukea met at a SMYAL (Sexual
Minority Youth Assistance League) meeting and became best friends.
They were inseparable to the point where they helped each other
transition and lived in an apartment together.

And unfortunately, they died together as well.

At 11:30 PM on August 12, 2002 the girls told friends they were
headed to a nearby gas station to pick up cigarettes. No one's
certain whether they actually accomplished their stated mission and
were in the process of returning or had even left. At around 3 AM
the girls were sitting in Thomas' Camry at a stop sign at 50th and C
Streets. Suddenly a car rolled up next to them and sprayed them with
semi automatic gunfire.

According to an eyewitness, another car approached the intersection
after the shooting and the driver got out to ascertain what had
happened. Ukea Davis was already dead and the driver nudged
Stephanie to see if by some miracle she was alive.
She acknowledged she was by moaning as he touched her shoulder.

But unfortunately the good Samaritan was forced to flee when the
shooters came back to finish their grisly work. The shooter got out
of the car and peppered the mortally wounded teens with more
gunfire. By the time rescue workers reached the bloodsoaked car
Stephanie was also dead. She and Ukea had taken ten rounds each.

Even in a city with a high murder rate such as Washington DC, the
execution style killings of two transgender teenagers rocked the
city and the DC transgender community. Their joint funeral was
packed. The people who spoke at the vigil held for them included
then mayor Anthony Williams and DC congressional Del. Eleanor Holmes
Norton.

As of this writing the perpetrators in the murders of Stephanie
Thomas and Ukea Davis still haven't been brought to justice. To make
things worse just four days after the vigil marking the one year
anniversary of the killings Washington underwent a series of
transgender murders. In the span of eight day two tranwomen were
killed and another survived a shooting near the US capitol building.

The sad part about the Thomas-Davis killing was the brutality of it.
While I'm happy that in the short time they had on the planet they
got to transition, sometimes it shocks me just how visceral the
hatred is toward transgender people. It saddens me to think about
the fact that Stephanie and Ukea didn't get a chance to unleash
whatever potential their lives held for them. It angers me to think
that someone hated or felt so threatened by Stephanie and Ukea just
openly living their lives that they picked up a gun and killed them.

Rest in peace, ladies.
 

 

Link to article in the Boston Globe

 

Nice article, my favorite line simply states...

 

 

-Dana

 

If you missed it, it was of course, one of your typical Larry Squabble Bauble's. 

 

I found it somewhat ...

 Transcript of Larry King Live 

 

-Dana

http://www.washingtontimes.com/article/20070807/NATION/108070036/1002

President Bush is committed to vetoing the latest effort to expand
federal "hate crimes" laws to include sexual orientation, even if it
means sending a defense authorization bill back to Congress, the
White House said.

"The qualifications [in the bill] are so broad that virtually any
crime involving a homosexual individual has potential to have hate
crimes elements," said White House spokesman Tony Fratto.

"The proposals they're talking about are not sufficiently narrow."

The veto threat adds another twist to the high-stakes battle between
the Democrat-led Congress and Mr. Bush over the Iraq war.

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts Democrat, attached the crime
measure to the defense authorization bill, which Democrats are
expected to use as a vehicle to try to alter war policy.

A coalition of religious leaders, many of them black Christian
pastors, have lobbied the White House to reject the amendment,
saying it could lead to suppression of free speech and religious
expression.

"The bill is not about crime prevention or even civil rights. It's
about outlawing peaceful speech - speech that asserts that
homosexual behavior is morally wrong," said Chuck Colson, a former
aide to President Nixon who now runs a Christian ministry to
prisoners.

The legislation would make it easier for federal law enforcement to
become involved in crimes against people based on their "sexual
orientation" and "gender identity."

Bishop Harry Jackson of Hope Christian Church in Lanham is leading
the High Impact Leadership Coalition, a group of Christian pastors
lobbying against the bill. The coalition is working with Tim
Goeglein, deputy director of the White House Office of Public
Liaison.

"He seems very receptive," Mr. Jackson said.

Mr. Kennedy's office says the bill "punishes violence, not speech."

"It covers only violent acts that result in death or bodily injury.
It does not prohibit or punish speech, expression or association in
any way - even hate speech," said a Kennedy aide.

"Nothing in the act will prohibit the lawful expression of anyone's
religious or political beliefs. People will always be free to speak
their mind about issues."

Mr. Fratto said the president, who has pushed for quick approval of
spending for U.S. troops, would send the defense bill back to
Capitol Hill if the hate-crime amendment remains attached.

The White House stopped short of saying it was opposed to the
language because of concerns about religious freedom.

Mr. Jackson agreed with the White House's assessment that the
measure's language is too broad. His coalition ran a full-page ad in
USA Today last month that said: "Don't muzzle our pulpits!"

"We believe prosecutors and anti-Christian groups will use loopholes
to muzzle the church from speaking out on biblical standards of
morality which are shared by most Americans."

House Majority Whip James E. Clyburn, a South Carolinian who leads
the House Democratic Faith Working Group, called that sentiment
"grossly inaccurate and highly prejudicial."

"Absolutely nothing in the [bill] in any way constrains the freedom
of expression or religion and I - who was born and raised in the
parsonage of a fundamentalist Christian church - believe it is wrong
to attempt to defeat civil rights legislation based on such a false
claim."

The House in May passed the hate crimes bill - which the homosexual
lobbying group Human Rights Campaign called "historic" - by a vote
of 237-180.