San Diego mayor Jerry Sanders, the Republican who reversed his opposition to marriage equality because of his lesbian daughter, will be a witness in the federal trial on the lawsuit seeking to overturn Proposition 8.

The mayor’s participation was announced Wednesday by San Francisco city attorney Dennis Herrera, according to the Gay & Lesbian Times of San Diego. San Francisco is a party to the lawsuit.

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The Tampa city council voted Thursday to extend antidiscrimination protections to transgender individuals over the objections of opponents, many of whom based their criticisms on religion.

The measure, which was proposed by the city’s Human Rights Board and passed the by city council unanimously in a preliminary vote November 5, underwent lengthier debate on Thursday, according to The Tampa Trubine.

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The organizers of the Gay Games in Cologne, Germany, are projecting better-than-expected registration numbers for the event in 2010.

So far, 2,500 athletes have applied to participate in the Gay Games, which are scheduled to take place July 31 to August 7. About 12,000 are expected to participate in the 34 sporting categories or five cultural events.

“We are ahead of projections at the moment,” said Michael Lohaus, copresident of the Cologne Gay Games. “Experience shows that more than half of all Gay Games participants register in the last few months before the opening ceremony. Especially in times of economic crisis, when most people are not able to make long-term decisions, we are more pleased with this overwhelming success.”

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Dovid G. Schwartz, editor of Zeh Journal, issued a press release saying the rabbis support “measures to distance the Orthodox Jewish communities” from elected officials and candidates who back gay marriage. He promised a survey of rabbis on the journal’s website, but Monday morning there was no survey, simply a promo saying, “Rabbis back condemning ‘same-sex marriage’ politicians … more to follow with the help of Gd.”

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The cabaret/jazz album just sold 500,000 copies; it debuted at #1 on the Billboard Charts when it was released on September 29, 2009. According to her publicist, Streisand is the “#1 female album-selling recording artist in history and the only woman to make the Top 10 all time best selling artists list.”

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Today the New York state senate will meet in a special session, where they could vote on the marriage equality bill. Last week, Governor David Paterson called for the extraordinary legislative session and put the bill on the senate’s agenda.

Several state senators and other elected officials have joined countless community members and residents in calling for a vote on the bill, which passed the assembly in May. A report in Sunday’s New York Times quotes Sen. Diane Savino of Staten Island as saying there is a 70% chance the bill will come to the floor on Tuesday.

Advocate.com will be updating you throughout the day on the marriage equality vote in Albany.

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Marriage advocates are in a race against the clock — and the opposition of the Trenton, N.J.–based National Organization for Marriage.

“New Jersey is at the very top of our list, and it’s going to happen in the next few weeks if it happens at all,” said Maggie Gallagher, the president of NOM, according to The Wall Street Journal. “They’re doing it in a lame duck, because it’s as far away from an election as possible.”

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Hutchison and Cornyn named Robert Pitman, a highly regarded judge, as one of their two picks for the top prosecutor’s job in the Western District of Texas. Pitman is openly gay, a fact that irks conservative Republicans, according to the Dallas Morning News. 

“Tim Lambert, president of the Texas Home School Coalition, a former member of the Republican National Committee — and, like nearly all prominent social conservatives in Texas who have picked sides, a Perry supporter — called the recommendation ‘very unusual and disturbing,’” according to the Dallas Morning News.

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Annise Parker, the openly gay candidate for mayor of Houston, spoke with CNN on Monday and said that her being gay is “just a piece of the package.”
 
Parker, who could become a gay mayor of the fourth largest city in the United States, downplayed the impact of her sexual orientation on her political career in an interview with The Situation Room.

“I have always stood up for the fact that I am gay,” she said, “and it’s part of the resume that I bring to the table, but it’s just a piece of the package.”

Parker, currently comptroller of Houston, faces a tight three-way contest on Tuesday. The race will likely go to a run-off election in December.

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A Democratic state house primary in Chicago this February will find an openly gay man and a lesbian candidate competing against each other, but neither one makes sexual orientation a selling point.

The primary in the northwest side’s 40th district will be historic, according to local NBC news blogger Matt Bartosik.

”Columbia College instructor Joe Laiacona — an openly gay man — has collected enough signatures to get on the ballot to challenge incumbent State Rep. Deb Mell — the first openly gay woman to serve in the Illinois General Assembly,” Bartosik writes. “If both keep their hats in the ring, the race will be the first of its kind at this level of politics in Illinois.”

However, Bartosik finds it unacceptable that neither candidate mentions sexual orientation in his or her online campaign bio.