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The Carolinas’ Most Comprehensive Gay & Lesbian Newspaper The Latest Q^POLL Results Which of the following statements most closely reflects your feelings about female impersonation in general? It is an art form I enjoy a good It demeans women to be respected show now & then & should be retired 24°'"" IS"''” Vote at www.q-notes.com Published Every Two Weeks On Recycled Paper » Volume 14, Number 6 » August 7, 1999 * FREE KentuclQ; soldier brutally murdered ' ' I-’-. 4- Governor George W. Bush Elizabeth Dole Analyzing candidates for president The Republicans by Gip Plaster Special to Q-Notes [Ed. Note: The next American president will take office during a pivotal time for the GLBT community. Cleary, this is an important election. In the first installment of this two-part series, we focused on the Democrats. This issue, we’ll exam ine the Republican presidential candidates and their positions.\ If fundraising ability is an indicator, analysts predicting that Republican presidential candi date and Texas governor George W. Bush has wrapped up his party’s" nomination may be right. Bush has raised more money than the com bined takes of Vice President A1 Gore and the other Democratic candidate, Sen. Bill Bradley (D-NJ). And Bush’s $36.2 million in funds far exceeds what his own challengers have man aged to raise. On gay and lesbian issues, none of the Re publican candidates have good records. Two of the candidates have made recent statements that could be interpreted as supportive of the gay and lesbian community. Another has publicly proclaimed support of gay candidates in the past while voting against gay and lesbian issues. The frontrunner Although he and his father claim Texas as home, George Walker Bush, son of former president George Herbert Walker Bush, was born in New Haven, Connecticut on July 6, 1946. His undergraduate degree is from Yale and his MBA came from Harvard. Before go ing into politics, he was an oilman and the owner of the Texas Rangers baseball team from 1989 to 1994. Even before his father won the White House, he came from a political family. He’s the grand son of the late Sen. Prescott Bush (R-CT). His brother, Jeb (R-FL) is now a governor, too. Texas gays and lesbians had a strained rela tionship with the governor from the beginning because he defeated flamboyant and gay- friendly governor Ann Richards in 1995. His actions since, however, have given them reason for their dislike of the governor. As recently as May, he refused to use his in fluence to get comprehensive hate crimes legis lation through the Texas Senate, despite pleas from the family of an African-American man dragged to death behind a pick-up truck and an appeal from President Clinton. “I wish Gov. Bush would have shown some leadership on this issue,” said Texas State Rep. SenfroniaThoippson, who proposed the House version of the bill, about Bush’s refusal to in tervene in the Senate. “Senators told us that the governor was using his influence to break the impasse. If that was using his influence. Lord help us if he becomes president.” Texas gay and lesbian leaders say Bush did See CANDIDATES on page 19 Senate passes hate crimes bill, focus moves to joint committee by David Stout Q-Notes Staff WASHINGTON, DC—In an historic vote, the US Senate approved the Hate Crimes Pre vention Act (HCPA) on July 22 without dis cussion or debate. If enacted, the legislation would expand the existing federal hate crimes law to cover disability status, gender and sexual orientation and make it easier for federal au thorities to investigate and prosecute violent crimes. “This is the first concrete action taken by either chamber since America buried Matthew Shepard, James Byrd Jr., Billy Jack Gaither and many transgendered people whose names and faces do not make the newspapers, said Kerry Lobel, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. “It is a good first step. But we have a long way to go and we must now turn to the House and tell our representatives by Dan Van Mourik Q-Notcs Staff FORT CAMPBELL, KY—When it was first learned that a Fort Campbell soldier had been beaten to death, information was sketchy and the military refused to release any details. But within three days of the attack, phone calls were placed to the Servicemembers Legal De fense Network (SLDN) calling the murder an anti-gay hate crime. The callers said the victim was gay and was killed as rumors about his re lationship with another man circulated on the post. Pfc. Barry Winchell, 21, was allegedly blud geoned with a baseball bat by one or more fel low soldiers in his unit on the night of July 5. He died the following morning at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, TN. The calls came to SLDN from the Lesbian and Gay Coalition for Justice (LGCJ) in Nash ville, soldiers at Fort Campbell and other local sources. But in spite of the calls. Fort Campbell spokeswoman Maj. Pamela Hart said Army investigators conducted interviews on the case and have “no conclusive evidence that this was a hate crime.” The Army, believes Winchell’s death was a result of a “physical altercation” and nothing more. But LGCJ and SLDN said their own inter views with enlisted people and civilians in Nash ville and Clarksville, TN lead them to suspect more people were involved in Winchell’s beat ing, and that the attackers’ ire was related to Winchell’s sexual orientation. SLDN talked to 50 Fort Campbell soldiers and civilians and distributed 3000 fliers at gay bars and clubs in Middle Tennessee, asking for help with the investigation. After SLDN intervened, the Army has changed its official stance to “[a] 11 aspects of his death will be examined and the results of this investigation will be made public as ap propriate.” On July 9, Post officials charged Pvt. Calvin N. Glover, 18, with premeditated murder for the attack which happened in a barracks hall way. Glover was transferred to Fort Knox, where he remains in custody pending a military hear ing similar to a grand jury. Fort Campbell officials later charged Spec. Justin R. Fisher, 25, in connection with Winchell’s death. Fisher is charged with four offenses. He allegedly: 1) participated as a prin cipal to prenveditated murder by encouraging Pvt. Calvin N. Glover to strike Winchell; 2) acted as an accessory after the fact; 3) made false statements to Army investigators, while under oath, concerning Winchell’s death; and 4) obstructed the investigation. Fisher is Winchell’s roommate and the per son who brought Winchell into his first gay relationship, Winchell’s boyfriend said. On the post, rumors of Winchell’s homo sexuality foreshadowed the attack, said Calpernia Addams, who said he had dated Winchell since late March. Addams said he and Winchell were introduced by the man now ac cused of encouraging the beating. It was Fisher who first introduced Winchell to The Connection, a gay nightclub in Nash ville, Addams said. Addams said Fisher had al ready been to the club and talked to his bud dies about a female impersonation act Addams performs on stage there. The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (NGLTF) called upon the military to fully in vestigate and disclose the nature of the killing. “Pfc. Winchell pledged to protect and defend his country,” said NGLTF Executive Director Kerry Lobel. “Who was protecting and defend ing Pfc. Wincficll?” This murder revives chilling memories of Allen Schindler, a sailor who was beaten to death by a fellow seaman in a homophobic rage. Schindler died in 1992, in Sasebo, Japan. The investigation into this crime may be severely hampered by the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Don’t Pursue” policy. Individuals who may have information relevant to the crime may be reluctant to cooperate with Army offi cials out of fear for their safety and the possi bility of losing their careers. T Firm amends vendor policy to reward GLBT-supportive companies how critically important this legislation is. In short, we must keep up the heat.” The Senate measure was passed as an amend ment to S. 1217, the Commerce, Justice, and State appropriations bill. Because the House version of the bill does not include the amend ment, final approval of HCPA in the current Congress will rest on the compromise reached by a joint House and Senate conference com mittee. Winnie Stachelberg, political director of the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), spoke opti mistically about the bill’s chances. “With strong administration backing and bipartisan support in both houses of Congress, we expect to be in a strong position in the conference committee to ensure final passage of the Hate Crimes Pre vention Act.” In a separate, same-day vote — that ap- See SENATE on page 27 Page by David Stout Q-Notes Staff GREENSBORO, NC—The out, male couple behind the nation’s second-largest gay- owned business is qui etly raising corporate America’s fairness IQ through a new com pany policy that gives trade preferences to vendors with written sexual orientation non discrimination poli cies. The effort began when company Presi dent Bob Page, 54, decided that his china, crys tal and flatware retailing company. Replace ments, Ltd, had an obligation to support ven dors that protect their gay and lesbian workers. “It’s something I’ve talked about for a long time,” he recalled. “For the last several years I have been quite openly gay and I feel an obli gation to help other [GLBT] people.” Page put his convictions into action by dis tributing approximately 300 letters in late June announcing that — whenever possible — his company would buy its goods and services from businesses with gay-positive employment poli cies. The letter explained, in part, “I have insti tuted a policy which states that Replacements, Ltd. wants to conduct business solely with those who can, at a minimum, show that they don’t discriminate against employees in any way due to their sexual orientation. This, along with quality, pricing and service, now constitute our vendor selection criteria.” Recipients were asked to respond within 30 days, providing details of their employment regulations. Surprisingly, what Page discovered as the calls and letters began to come in was precisely how confused many employers were abourfederal and state employment protections relative to gays and lesbians. “Most [employers] just said they never re ally thought about it,” Page recalled. “But a lot of them said they already covered gays because they followed all state and federal employment guidelines. I had to ex plain to them that there weren’t any state or federal laws protect ing gay employees. They didn’t realize that a person could lose their job just for being gay-” The discussions convinced Page to do a follow-up letter clarify- ITedrickson ing the absence of government-mandated pro tections for gay and lesbian workers — under- See POLICY on page 19
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