“NewsWrap" for the week ending March 21, 2009 (As broadcast on "This Way Out" program #1,095, distributed 3-23-09) [Written by Greg Gordon, with thanks to Rex Wockner with Bill Kelley] Reported this week by Michael LeBeau and John Torres The United States has belatedly signed onto a United Nations declaration urging that LGBT people be guaranteed basic human rights. The action joined a growing list of the Obama administration’s reversals of Bush administration policy. 66 of the U.N.’s 192 member countries, including virtually every other Western nation, along with Japan, Mexico, Israel, and others, signed the document last December, which was spearheaded by France and co-sponsored by the Netherlands. It was the first time a statement condemning human rights abuses against LGBT people had been presented to the U.N. General Assembly. In refusing to sign on, the Bush administration claimed that the declaration raised legal questions that needed further review, including the possible encroachment on state’s rights. More than 50 nations, including members of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, also opposed the declaration. Current State Department spokesman Robert Wood told reporters this week that a "careful interagency review" by the Obama administration concluded that "supporting this statement commits us to no legal obligations." The 13-point statement declares that “human rights apply equally to every human being, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity.” It also condemns “violence, harassment, discrimination, exclusion, stigmatization and prejudice... directed against persons in all countries in the world because of sexual orientation or gender identity.” The Vatican, while not an official member of the U.N., also opposed the declaration. And Pope Benedict XVI seemed bent on further marginalizing the Roman Catholic Church as he began a visit to Africa this week. Church doctrine unequivocally opposes the use of contraceptive devices during sexual activity, and insists that abstinence is the only effective weapon in fighting the spread of HIV and AIDS. Heading to a region ravaged by the disease but with the fastest-growing number of converts, the Pope insisted that condom distribution actually boosts the rate of infection. “You can’t resolve it with the distribution of condoms,” he told reporters aboard his plane before it landed in Cameroon. “On the contrary,” he said, “it increases the problem.” His remarks sparked immediate condemnation around the world by human rights and HIV/AIDS groups. The French foreign ministry said the statement would “endanger public health policies and the imperative to protect human life.” Belgium's health minister said the Pope's comments reflected "a dangerous doctrinaire vision." Two German ministers called them “irresponsible.” A “New York Times” editori al said the Pope was “grievously wrong.” The Vatican tried to spin the Pope’s words following the uproar, saying that he only wanted to emphasize responsible sexual conduct. That came on the same day Spain announced that it would send a million condoms to Africa to fight the spread of HIV on the continent. Prime Minister José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero has been at odds with the Vatican on other issues, such as marriage equality, since he took office in 2004. The Spanish health ministry said in a statement that "Condoms have been demonstrated to be a necessary element in prevention policies and an efficient barrier against the virus." In other news, Denmark’s Parliament passed a bill this week giving adoption rights to civilly united same-gender couples, giving them parity with their heterosexually married counterparts. Equality activists had spent the past decade fighting for the legislation. The opposition Social Democrats and Socialist People’s Party supported the bill. While the center-right government officially opposed it, 7 members of the ruling Liberal Party voted in favor. Gays and lesbians were previously allowed to adopt as individuals, and to adopt a partner’s existing children. Denmark became the first country in the world to create civil unions for same-gender couples in 1989. But it lags behind countries that have since opened marriage to gays and lesbians. Danish LGBT groups hope passage of the adoption bill will spu r lawmakers to support marriage equality legislation. A gender-neutral civil marriage bill was introduced in Israel’s Parliament late last month, though it has little chance of advancing. But a Tel Aviv family court has approved the first-ever adoption by a gay male couple. Under an unusual set of circumstances, 30-year-old Yossi Even-Kama is now the legal son of former M.P. Uzi Even and his husband Amit Kama. Yossi was disowned by his parents for coming out when he was 16 years old, and he found a new home with the longtime gay couple. They legally married in Canada in 2004, but their marriage is not recognized in Israel. Even teaches chemistry at Tel Aviv University, and in 2007 Yossi applied there, seeking the reduced tuition rate available to children of professors. He was turned down because Even was not his legal father, prompting the unprecedented adoption effort. Kama told the “Jerusalem Post” that “The parent-child relationship has existed with us for 14 years... We always were a loving, living family but were not recognized by the authorities.” He called the adoption approval “a great victory.” This was the first time that a gay male couple has won adoption rights in Israel. In 2005, the country’s Supreme Court ruled that the lesbian partner of a woman who birthed a child had co-parenting rights and approved an adoption in that case. A U.S. federal judge this week ordered the state20of Louisiana to put the names of 2 out-of-state fathers on the birth certificate of their adopted son, who was born in the Louisiana city of Shreveport but legally adopted in the state of New York. U.S. district judge Jay Zainey decided that because a New York court approved the joint adoption by Oren Adar and Mickey Ray Smith, the U.S. Constitution’s Full Faith and Credit provisions require Louisiana to revise the birth certificate to show both men as the child’s parents. The case was initiated when Smith was denied a revised birth certificate, in part to include his son in his health insurance coverage, and was told that Louisiana law doesn’t recognize same-gender relationships and prohibits adoption by 2 single people. The state is planning to appeal the court order. Meanwhile, some marriage equality activists are not waiting for the California Supreme Court ruling on a challenge to Proposition 8. The Secretary of State’s office this week officially approved an effort to collect signatures on a proposed ballot initiative to overturn the constitutional marriage ban. The group Yes on Equality has until August 17th to gather about 700,000 signatures to qualify the measure for the 2010 ballot. A Vermont Senate committee has unanimously approved a bill that would legalize same-gender marriage in the state. Vermont was the first in the nation to create civil unions for gay and lesbian couples, but activists there have been pushing for full marr iage equality. The senate Judiciary Committee heard emotional debate during a public hearing on the bill this week that drew hundreds to the Statehouse. The full Senate is expected to take up the bill in the coming week. Republican Governor Jim Douglas has said he opposes marriage for same-gender couples, but has not indicated whether he would veto the bill if it passes legislative muster. The Minnesota Family Council is pushing a constitutional amendment in that state to prohibit same-gender marriage because, the group says, banning such marriages will prevent the end of the world seriously. p; Religious leaders from all major faiths joined the group at a press conference this week to support that argument, though the effort is unlikely to gather much legislative support. "This is not a political issue, or an issue of choice or rights,” said Andre Dukes, pastor of Shiloh Temple Church in Minneapolis. “It is an issue of life." Ikram ul-Huq, the imam and religious director of the Muslim Community Center of Bloomington, told reporters that “If everyone is a gay, this world will cease to exist in ten years.” A bill recently introduced in the Minnesota legislature would open marriage to same-gender couples by making applicable laws gender-neutral. And finally, leading American dictionary publisher Mirriam-Webster defines marriage as “(1): the state of being united to a person of the opposite sex as husband or wife in a consensual and contractual relationship recognized by law” and “(2): the state of being united to a person of the same sex in a relationship like that of a traditional marriage.” Even though the more-inclusive definition was added in 2003, commentators at the rightwing World Net Daily Web site discovered the change this week and began ranting about it. "What we are finding odd is that this is neither news nor unusual," said Mirriam-Webster spokesman Arthur Bicknell. "In fact,” he told reporters, “we were kind of late to the party. We were one of the last ones among the major dictionary publishers to do this." The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language last modified its definition of marriage in 2000. After the traditional description, the fourth example it gives is "A union between two persons having the customary but usually not the legal force of marriage: a same-sex marriage." A more inclusive definition of marriage was also added in draft form this month to the Oxford English Dictionary, which publisher Oxford University Press describes as "the definitive record of the English language." Noting that "the term is now sometimes used with reference to long-term relationships between partners of the same sex," the dictionary's editors have proposed updating the primary definition of the word to simply mean "the condition of being a husband or wife; the relation between persons married to each other; matrimony." Dictionary publishers have apparently already see n the writing on the wall so to speak. Job Hunting? Start with the companies that posted job openings this week.