Gay Marriage

Janet Napolitano is not afraid to stand up for equal rights for gays, lesbians and the transgendered. Although she's politically savvy enough not to endorse full marriage rights for loving homosexual couples (especially considering how backwards some Arizona voters are - remember the MLK holiday vote), she has not been shy about her support for civil unions for gay couples. Janet is even gutsy enough to say so in the newspaper serving the neanderthal areas of Mesa and Gilbert:

East Valley Tribune, September 30, 2002

None of the four candidates supports same-sex marriage. But two of them have said permitting "civil commitment" ceremonies recognized by the state - as is done in Vermont - is acceptable. . . . Salmon and Mahoney also oppose "civil commitment" ceremonies between same-sex partners. Napolitano said, "I support having equal benefits for all in our state."

In another story she reiterated her support for diversity of loving relationships:

Arizona Republic, October 24, 2002

And if the candidate is a single workaholic in her 40s with no known significant other since becoming a public figure, she faces other questions. . . .

"I do have an agenda of tolerance for the many diverse types of families we have in Arizona."

TAKE THAT EAST VALLEY CONSERVATIVES!!!

Protecting Gays, Lesbians, and the Transgendered from Discrimination

Janet Napolitano authored legislation to protect gays, lesbians and the transgendered from all forms of discrimination:

The Gay Financial Network, January 17, 2001

[Napolitano's bill] is the most encompassing bill pending before the Legislature . . . [and] was authored by the office of Attorney General Janet Napolitano . . . . [The bill] would add sexual orientation and gender identity to the list of protected classes for businesses with 15 or more employees. The bill would also make it illegal to turn gay, lesbian or transsexual people, as well as other protected classes, away from housing and hotels and motels.

The bill didn't pass, but it would have stopped bigoted parents from preventing transvestites or transsexuals from teaching in the schools. It would have also stopped discrimination in housing, by making people ignore their religious bigotry when it comes to renting rooms, houses or apartments to gays, lesbians, or transsexuals.

Watch out grandpa, you're going to be renting that guest house to my friends before much longer.

Gay Adoption

Janet Napolitano cares enough about children to know that loving parents are loving parents, regardless of the gender of the parents' sexual partners. She's also brave enough to let everyone know where she stands:

Arizona Daily Star, October 1, 2002
Of the four candidates, only Democrat Janet Napolitano supports permitting gays to adopt children placed by the state Department of Economic Security. She said finding a permanent home is preferable to having children in limbo in foster care. . . .

"We have thousands and thousands of children who don't have homes," Napolitano said. "Let's talk about the children who are out there" who may be "stuck in foster care, waiting for a safe, secure adoption."

Salmon, however, wants a ban. His publicist, Camilla Strongin, said Salmon supports placing children only in "the most beneficial and positive environment."

"He thinks that children should be placed in a loving family with a mother and father," she said.

Salmon is such a hypocrite to claim to be for children, but wants to deny adoption just because a couple happens to be two women, or two men, or pre-operative transexuals. What difference should it make who the parents have sex with as long as they love and want children???

Abortion Rights

Janet Napolitano may be the strongest abortion-rights proponent in the entire country. She will stand firm to protect the right of any woman or girl to exercise control over her own body without interference from husbands, parents or the government. She has also not been afraid to stand up to the insidious attempts of anti-choicers to use the hobgoblins of partial birth abortion and making girls tell their parents before exercising control over their bodies:

Arizona Republic, October 23, 2002

Napolitano is pro-choice, and more of a centrist on fiscal issues. She is the only one of the four gubernatorial candidates that opposes parental consent and a mandatory 24-hour waiting periods for abortions.

"I respect a woman's right to choose," Napolitano said. "These are all things that are done to undercut the right of a woman's right to choose. It is the most intimate decision a woman can make.

Salmon pounced on the abortion issue whenever it popped up.

"She supports abortion on demand, in any way, shape or form," Salmon said. "There are folks out there that have abortion for gender selection. And Janet apparently supports that, too."

She doesn't play word games with such an important right of women. She is unequivocal:

Arizona Daily Star, October 22, 2002

Salmon said he at least wants parents involved in abortion decisions, while Napolitano said simply "no" when asked if there should be any restrictions on abortion."

Support Napolitano if you don't want zealots to force girls to have to get tell from their parents before exercising their constitutional rights.

Napolitano's committment to protecting an absolute right to abortion is longstanding. In 1999, she refused to even argue in court to uphold a ban on so-called "partial-birth abortion" despite pressure from zealots who think that a woman's right to control her own body ends in the last few weeks of pregnancy.

Associated Press, March 5, 1999

Abortion opponents blasted state Attorney General Janet Napolitano Friday for dropping Arizona's defense of a law banning a medical procedure critics call partial-birth abortion.

Napolitano, a Democrat, notified a federal appeals court last week that she would not defend the law, which was struck down by a federal judge in 1997. Her predecessor, Republican Grant Woods, had asked the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco to uphold the Arizona statute.

Protecting the Environment

Janet Napolitano is not afraid to stand up to the military industrial complex. When Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld (he of the Bush war machine) asked Napolitano to support weakening the Endangered Species Act to stop environmental lawsuits from shutting down training exercises, she stood up to the war mongers and told them that protecting the environment comes first. Here's the text of the Rumsfeld letter:

May 1, 2002

Dear Attorney General

We must provide our military forces the most realistic training possible. Over the years though, a number of federal, state, and local actions have restricted the use of our military training facilities. . . . .

The Readiness and Range Preservation Initiative is a narrowly focused proposal intended to clarify the reach of several environmental laws. The laws increasingly have been applied to military testing and training activities in novel ways that threaten readiness without a commensurate benefit to the environment. . . .

You will see that these provisions apply to a narrow, unique category of Defense Department activities -- those that directly involve military readiness. They do not affect the wide range of our activities that do not directly relate to combat, such as our wastewater treatment plants, power generation facilities, construction projects and routine transportation. Our proposals do not affect our cleanup obligations at our closed bases, or those based that may close in the future.

Janet saw through puppet-master Rumsfeld's lies and opposed the measure:

July 5, 2002

I am in receipt of our letter soliciting the State of Arizona's support for the Readiness and Range Preservation Initiative (S. 2225). While I fully support your efforts to secure realistic combat training and testing conditions for our armed forces, such training needs to be conducted in compliance with existing environmental laws. . . .

You will therefore understand why I cannot endorse S. 2225 . . . . Arizona may now be left with no alternative but to resort to the very laws from which DOD seeks exemptions in this bill in order to protect the public health and welfare, and to bring the Army into compliance.

What a courageous woman! Janet is willing to stand up for the environment even if it means taking on the vested interests of the military industrial complex. Does anyone doubt that Arizona's environment would be much better off if we'd go ahead and sue the military to shut down Luke altogether? Janet is the only politician brave enough to do so.

TAXES

Janet Napolitano knows that Arizona isn't spending enough money on education and health care. Fortunately, she's politically astute enough not to fall into Salmon's trap of being specific about the massive income tax increases Arizona needs to fund its priorities. Janet has cleverly made it clear that she will raise taxes enough to provide funding for education and health care without giving her opponents too much ammunition.

Arizona Republic, September 25, 2002

After the debate, Napolitano said Arizona's years of income tax cuts, some of which Salmon helped pass as a state senator, weren't "economically smart."

"They were a mistake in the sense that they were made without looking for what Arizona needs by way of schools, by way of health care and so forth," Napolitano said.

When asked if she would increase personal and corporate income tax rates, Napolitano answered, "We're going to look at everything."

She lets the voters know what's going to happen without spelling it out for the anti-tax zealots:

East Valley Tribune, October 20, 2002

"We're not going to raise tax rates now," the Democratic gubernatorial nominee said last week at a news conference. Asked to explain "now," she clarified that to mean ever.

That kind of nuance is what defines much of the debate for governor this election year. . . . Napolitano has been critical of what she calls the failed fiscal policies of the last decade. they were not well thought out and were made at the expense of full funding of schools, she said. Through the 1990s, personal income taxes were cut 25 percent, corporate icnome taxes were cut 26 percent, the state's property tax was eliminated and vehicle registration fees were slashed.

But Napolitano insists she has no plans to roll back those tax cuts, even though she says she will look at them in the context of overall tax policy.