1. Watch venomous anti-gay marriage ad entitled “A Gathering Storm.”

2. Hear lines such as “The clouds are dark, and the winds are strong, and I am afraid. Some who advocate for same-sex marriage have taken the issue far beyond same-sex couples. They want to bring the issue into my life. My freedom will be taken away.” Snarf Frappuccino.

3. Cleanse palate below. UPDATED! N.O.M. was able to have the hilarious Weather Girls remix of their ad taken down! So… 3. You click around YouTube looking for another posting of it and notice with a chuckle just how many parodies there are of this putrid ad and then…

4. Settle on watching Lizz Winstead’s preposterously non-sequitur-filled take on the subject:

We’re pretty sure Vermont’s Republican governor was installed by extraterrestrials in the first place. And in this human v. alien battle, the good guys have won one for civil rights. As Reuters just reported: “Vermont lawmakers on Tuesday overrode a veto from the governor in passing a bill that would allow same-sex marriage, clearing the way for the state to become the fourth in the nation where gay marriage is legal.” [Insert visual: BG high-fiving Ben, Jerry.]

Scott Simon:

…[G]ays could begin getting married in Iowa in just three weeks.

“If gay and lesbian people must submit to different treatment without an exceedingly persuasive justification,” the Iowa justices wrote, “they are deprived of the benefits of the principle of equal protection upon which the rule of law is founded.”

Whatever the final result may be, it seems to me that the decision reminds us that gay life in America is not confined to certain zip codes of lower Manhattan, West Hollywood, Miami’s South Beach and Chicago’s Lakeview. It is as American as Iowa.

Same-sex couples can marry in Cedar Rapids. (But not in San Francisco. Go figure.)

Formerly arrow-straight eHarmony.com “has come out of the closet,” the L.A. Times reports. As BreakupGirl.net noted in November, the website, which has eHarmonized only male-female couples since its inception in 2000, is launching a gay matchmaking service. The catch, as the L.A. Times put it: “EHarmony’s new relationship with the gay community is more like a shotgun wedding.” How so? Because the company agreed to start the gay service only as part of a settlement with the New Jersey attorney general in the wake of a discrimination suit.

Which makes BG wonder even harder about the name of the new venture: CompatiblePartners.com. No, yeah. Really. What went on in that meeting? Did no one raise a hand and say, “But wait, aren’t the gays more … sparkly?”  Did that name edge out Meh.com?* Plus: though the L.A. Times reports the site’s up as of yesterday, well, go look. Urrr? As of this posting, anyway, it’s totally still just a placeholder.com.

I mean, does someone over there want this to fail?

* Anyone remember “Lowered Expectations“?

Today’s lesson: it’s hard to be homophobic when the gay guy is your cool teach.

Via The Daily Beast:

When comic-book fans last saw Bruce Wayne, a.k.a. Batman, he was pushed from a speeding jet without his cape or face mask and was presumed to be dead. The Independent reports now on his replacement — Batwoman, a.k.a. Kathy Kane…[whose] debut marks a cultural landmark for the gay rights movement and is part of DC Comics’ concerted effort to introduce an ethnically and sexually diverse range of characters. “We’ve been waiting to unlock her. It’s long overdue,” said writer Greg Rucka. “Yes, she’s a lesbian. She’s also a redhead. It is an element of her character. It is not her character. If people are going to have problems with it, that’s their issue.”

Speaking of issues, Batwoman will be the subject of at least 12.

Finally! It took a lawsuit, but still.

LiLo and SaRo to get engaged in Paris?

Felicitacions!

Then, we imagine, it’s off to Le Connecticut?

Per Andrew Sullivan: activist Amy Balliet.

“In marriage, God and family keep us accountable. But government is supposed to provide the rights to help us stay accountable. If we are outside of Washington state, for example, and one of us goes into the hospital, the absence of those rights makes it impossible to be able to take care of each other and to live up to the commitments we have made to one another,” she says.

Respek.