Many of you have asked me if the publisher of San Diego LGBT Weekly, Stampp Corbin is obsessed with pro-equality Republicans as his commentary last week was about the twelfth time he has blasted pro-equality Republicans, Mayor Kevin Faulconer and their GLBT supporters. In fact, Stampp has tried to paint Mayor Faulconer’s supporters as “prostitutes” and “charlatans”. Well, as I’ve said before, Stampp Corbin loves to remind us that he is a product of Chicago politics which as we all know is one of the most corrupt political machines in the country and I guess Stampp fantasizes himself as a “Boss Daley” of San Diego’s GLBT community and he knows what is best for us.
Now let me make it quite clear, yes, I was a registered Republican until AIDS and the Reagan era. The then chair of the San Diego Democratic Party, Ms. Irma Munoz herself registered me as a Democrat which I have been ever since.
I have served on the California State Democratic Central Committee, having been appointed by State Assemblyman Peter Chacon (then chair of the Hispanic caucus) and Assemblywoman Toni Atkins. I was involved in the Jesse Jackson presidential campaign and endorsed Bill Clinton when he was still the governor of Arkansas.
But all my life, like many Americans I have voted for the person not the party. From having dinner with then Democratic Gov. Gray Davis (I was state chair of Equality California) to going to Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s home for dinner. Yes, I endorsed both of their re-election campaigns.
By the way, Republican Gov. Schwarzenegger signed more pro-GLBT equality bills than any governor in our state’s history.
Recently, many of us have noticed the growing nasty negative attacks on pro-equality Republicans (including my publisher) and most of these are from diehard Democrats. The fact is that there is a growing movement to change the Republican Party and some Democratic leaders hate the thought of both party’s being for LGBT equality. (Let’s not forget it took those seven Republican U.S. senators votes to end Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.)
San Diego has the best pro-equality Republicans in the nation … period.
Our popular mayor, Kevin Faulconer, within two weeks after being elected accepted the national co-chair of Mayors For Marriage Equality and, of course, this paper never even mentioned it. Jess Durfee, the past Democratic Party chair slammed Republican Bonnie Dumanis (the first elected lesbian district attorney in America who is Republican)… of course, Jess never mentioned that he had endorsed Bonnie’s opponent.
The attacks on openly gay Republican congressional candidate Carl DeMaio and his partner have become very vicious and cross the line. The attacks on pro-equality Councilwoman Lorie Zapf also cross the line of decency and truth.
The truth is that both straight and gay Republicans are being attacked just because they are Republicans … period. I have personally met with both the national co-chair and state chair of the Republican Party and I believe that there is an ongoing fight for the future of the Republican Party and I strongly support those Republicans who are trying to change this party.
Yes, as a Latino gay man I do not support the entire platform of the Republican Party but neither do all Republicans … Mayor Faulconer, District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis, Jerry Sanders, Supervisor Ron Roberts, State Assemblyman Rocky Chavez, Councilwoman Lorie Zapf, Carl DeMaio, Chris Cate, Sheriff Bill Gore … are good solid public servants … are pro-GLBT marriage … are decent caring people … stop trying to demonize them just because they are Republican.
PUBLISHERS NOTE:
The Republican Party platform vows to pass a constitutional amendment to make marriage between one man and one woman. Nicole, are you so uninformed that you do not know that? Sorry, but I don’t give anybody a pass that supports the Republican platform, ergo anyone who runs as a Republican who wants my vote or the vote of the LGBT community needs to publicly repudiate the platform with respect to LGBT rights. Plain and simple. Not hard to say, so why do so many Republican candidates refuse to do it?
Nicole Murray Ramirez has been an award-winning columnist since 1973, and a Latino and gay activist for more than 45 years. He is currently a city commissioner and has served the last seven mayors of San Diego. He is also a national board member of the Harvey Milk Foundation and chairman of the International Court Council of the USA, Canada and Mexico. In 2013 Murray Ramirez was named “Mayor of Hillcrest” by a City proclamation. Nicolemrsandiego@aol.com
Nicole, Lori Zapf is about as pro equality as you are young and pretty. As for Carl DeMaio and his partner, they are both an embarrassment to San Diego.
Have you ever had a direct conversation with Lori Zapf and about her position? I would suggest that people don’t bash her until they have a decant and respectful conversation with her. Have an open mind.
Jeff- read Zapf’s email to James Hartline where she agrees with him that “we need to keep gays out of local office.” She is either a hater or a liar.
Once again, have you asked her directly? And can people change their position? I can think of many people that have changed their position on both sides….let’s see…Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, Jerry Sanders, Rocky Chavez…the list goes on and on.
Jeff comparing what Lorie Zapf said to the evolutions of Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, etc. is straight up stupidity.
There is a significant difference between “I believe marriage is between a man and a woman” and saying that not only that but I also oppose their first amendment right to hold public office and they are living in sin and going to hell. Grab some perspective please, this Lady thought so little of gays that she supported treating gays like felons and restricting constitutional rights. In what world is that comparable??
She apologized for her email. Think about it! Bill Clinton SIGNED DOMA that took away our right to marry and now he says he regrets it. I see how that is completely different. I see how this double standard works….Bill Clinton and change his mind about gay marriage but Lori Zapf can’t. Makes complete sense.
Though I am not always inclined to agree with Stampp Corbin, when it comes to labeling you a “charlatan”, Mr. Corbin could not be more on the mark.
For years, you have suckled at the bosom of any power hungry politician or power elite in this city while they lavished you with superficial trinkets. You have pimped the LGBT community both figuratively and literally for decades.
Today you stand alongside another gathering of fair weather friends – Bonnie Dumanis, Carl DeMaio, Lori Zapf and Kevin Fauloner and try perpetrate a mythology that only you could believe. Kevin Faulconer has not earned the right to be called an ally of the LGBT community. Until he needed our votes, Kevin was an arms length friend at best. The same goes for Zapf, who has a well documented past of anti gay statements, but now that she is redistricted – she has “evolved”.
What you fail to acknowledge in your column above is that being an ally of the LGBT community is about more than just marriage equality, and Carl DeMaio could not even stand to be counted for that until the Supreme Court rendered its verdict. What about ENDA? Will DeMaio put his neck out for his own community and deliver ENDA? Or will he keep his promise to Prop 8 attorney Charles LiMandri to stay out of gay rights? The LGBT agenda is as much about social justice as it is civil rights. Will DeMaio back raising the minimum wage when he is seated? You already know better.
What good is Bonnie Dumanis when she cannot even stand up to County Clerk Ernie Dronenberg when he allowed his office to be taken over by LiMandri as a base of operations to fight for Prop 8?
And what good are you to the LGBT community, when you cannot even call out one of the biggest charlatans of this community, David Copley, until he is dead?!?!
Were you just to busy finding him you gay call boys for his orgies? I’m so glad you had the guts to throw a glass of wine in his face when he refused to come to the help of his community during the AIDS crisis, but do you really think that stage gesture excuses you? You let his mother continue to brutalize our community in the UT while maintaining the mythology of her son as a “committed bachelor”.
Where were you when LiMandri was attacking young LGBT students on the USD campus? Three years on, they have been putting on one of the finest expressions of diversity in the middle of adversity and you have yet to even show up. You are an insult to the young LGBT’s that are emerging today. You are a sycophant to power and an acolyte of the wealthy. Quintessentially conservative – standing in the tents with the royalty while the blood of the community spills down the hill.
What’s great about NCR on the defensive? The constant use of PERIODS! the admittance of guilt as she defends her gang members and her lofty assessment of all things NCR. It’s a bunch of baloney. It’s absurd . I hope the writing on the wall is for the LGBT WEEKLY publisher to cancel the column. It simply is no difference than a Rush Limbaugh rant and I think we can do better journalism and commentary.
#recallmayorofhillcrest
“Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me” When you gay liberal elitists (a,k,a Staamp Corbin) call out the Beverly Hilton owner for KILLING gays and STONING them to death, instead of what people say back in the day with your “Throwback” rants is so pitiful and desperate Corbin. Let us see if at the Harvey Milk Breakfast *(if you show up) your concerns to all the republican elected officials. I doubt it because only coward sit in there glass boxes throwing ping pongs, BTW Stampp, if Log Cabin of San Diego are sooooooo beneath you, why are we always in your editorials 9 months and counting. What are u worried about #Felicia? Boop!
It would be my honor to re-register you again, Nicole.
Does anyone besides a few die-hards even read the LGBT Weekly anymore?
It is little more than a forum for race baiting and left wing hate speech and hypocrisy –just like Citybeat, its boring straight counterpart.
Every time I’m told by the likes of publisher Stampp Corbin who I’m supposed to vote for, I’m inclined to vote for the opposite.
Mr. Corbin, you do not decide who I vote for.
I was gay and out long before any mainstream black politicians supported gay rights, and at a time when almost all out and visible gays were white and male.
There was never any affirmative action for us — not as whites, not as males and not as gays.
But now our gay “leadership” complains about whites and males ad infinitum, including gay white males.
Your double standard — giving Democrats a pass when they fail to support gay rights, but bashing Republicans for having a party platform on gay marriage that Obama himself would have supported in 2008 is nothing but rank hypocrisy.
It’s okay for blacks and Democrats not to support gay equality, but not okay for whites and Republicans? Really?
Just how hypocritical can you get?
You are nothiing but a racist propagandist against whites — never mind that the black and Latino communities as a whole have NEVER supported gays on marriage equality or anything else.
Kudos to Nicole for standing up to your bullying. For all of her faults, she has a hell of a lot more integrity than you have.
I did some fact checking.
Mr. Corbin claims that the Republican Party Platform “vows” to pass a Constitutional amendment restricting marriage to marriage between a man and a woman.
That is not true.
The last completed national Republican platform was for the 2012 presidential election. It expresses a belief that marriage should be between a man and a woman, but it says nothing about a constitutional amendment.
The 2016 platform obviously has not been completed yet, or even started.
So what gives? As usual, the left makes up “facts” that don’t exist.