Watching the election returns

I'm watching the election returns tonight, with a particular eye toward the ballot measures addressing gay and lesbian equality. This isn't the #1 issue for most of the major news networks, so I did a Google search and came up with a site called Autostraddle.com: "news, entertainment, and girl-on-girl culture." They're "live-blogging" the election results and have the figures I'm interested in sooner than anyone else. Plus, they seem to have lots of great resources for people interested in gay and lesbian issues, from current news to links, events, and gay-themed art. Worth checking out further at another time.

Meanwhile, at the moment the two main ballot issues are running as follows:

Washington (where a "yes" vote affirms the new law, passed by the legislature, giving domestic partnership but not marriage rights to gay and lesbian couples): Yes 52.42%, No 47.58%. Good news so far!

Maine (where a "no" vote affirms the new law, passed by the legislature, allowing gay marriage): Yes 51.86%, No 48.15%, with 73% reporting. Not good news so far.

Both measures are close, which just baffles me to no end. For me, marriage equality is a no-brainer. How can it be a good thing for people with interlocking sex organs to marry but somehow it's not for an equally-committed same sex partnership? I could go into the logic in more depth, but I'm too tired tonight, and I suspect that you, dear reader, either agree with me already or never will no matter how much reason and logic is applied.

What a sad world we live in where the bedrock necessity of equal rights still isn't obvious to everyone, even in America! I just hope Washington holds on and Maine pulls it off.

The best "live blog" entry tonight:

"Rachel Maddow has a cute graphic for Referendum 71. But since I can’t take a screenshot of my TV, I’ll just show you this photo instead (I made it small, you will have to click.)"