Unhinged NOM Chair John Eastman Says Donors Were Victimized During Prop. 8 Campaign: VIDEO

Testifying before the GOP-led House Ways and Means Committee today over the IRS Tea Party 'scandal', NOM Chair John Eastman said "traditional marriage" supporters were "harassed, assaulted on the streets, vandalized on their property" during the Prop. 8 campaign to the point where they were fearful of giving money to the organization.

Eastman also received a round of applause from the room after accusing Rep. Earl Blumenauer of "scurrilous" remarks for saying that the groups before the committee were political and shouldn't be called 'social welfare' organizations.

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...

More on Eastman's testimony from McClatchy here.

UPDATE: Blumenauer responds to this nonsense in the HuffPost.

Let's get real and stop the charade about what a 'social welfare' organization is.

Last year, internal National Organization for Marriage (NOM) strategy documents were leaked, stating that the organization seeks "to drive a wedge between gays and blacks" by promoting "African American spokespeople for marriage," thus provoking same-sex marriage supporters into "denouncing these spokesmen and women as bigots," and "to interrupt the assimilation" of Latinos into "dominant Anglo culture" by making the stance against same-sex marriage "a key badge of Latino identity."

Does this sound like social welfare to you? Social welfare organizations should work in the public interest -- not to divide, exploit, and conquer.

Facebook Disables Game in Which Orthodox Christians Destroy Gay Activists

Yesterday we reported on a Facebook game in which Orthodox Christians destroy gay activists with stools which appeared to be modeled after recent real-life attacks on Gay Pride marchers in Tblisi, Georgia.

A Facebook spokesman tells Towleroad that they have disabled the game app:

"We take action against apps that violate our platform policies as laid out here: https://developers.facebook.com/policy/, in order to maintain a trustworthy experience for users."

LGBT Issues Make Appearance at Bradley Manning Trial: VIDEO

The Bradley Manning trial enters its second day today. It is expected to run all summer.

The AP reports on the first day:

The soldier from Crescent, Okla., has said he did not believe the information would harm the U.S. and he released the information to enlighten the public about the bitter reality of America’s wars.

...His attorney has also said Manning struggled privately with gender identity early in his tour of duty, when gays couldn’t openly serve in the military. Those struggles led Manning to “feel that he needed to do something to make a difference in this world,” Coombs said.

[Adrian Lamo, a convicted hacker] testified Manning had contacted him because of his notoriety in the hacking community and because of his open support and leadership in the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.

Watch a clip from Reason TV on the protests in support of Bradley Manning, AFTER THE JUMP...

UK House of Lords Approves Marriage Equality Bill in Voice Vote

UK's House of Lords has approved the marriage equality bill in a voice vote and rejected the "wrecking amendment" by a wide margin in a 390-148 vote, the Guardian reports.

Peers have voted by a majority of 242 to allow the gay marriage bill to continue its passage through the Lords. Although victory for the pro-bill lobby was never seriously in doubt, the size of their win took some peers by surprise. The Lords voted by 390 votes to 148 to reject an attempt by Lord Dear, a crossbencher, to defeat the bill at second reading. It is very unusual for the Lords to block a bill at second reading and some peers may have been voting against Dear because they were opposed to the idea of the Lords trying to obstruct legislation in this way, not because they were great supporters of the bill. But the size of the majority means the bill must now be certain to become law. However, it is still likely that attempts will be made to amend it in the Lords, in particular to strengthen the protection available to churches who do not want to conduct gay weddings. Lady Stowell, a government whip, told peers in her wind-up speech that the government would not necessarily object to amendments of this kind.

The bill moves to its next stage of consideration, the Committee stage.

The Future of Pizza Delivery, By Drone? — VIDEO

Of course, if you don't tip well, it may shoot you down.

NBC News reports:

The delivery was masterminded by a T + Biscuits, an English creative agency that was hired by Domino's to test prototypes. "We're looking at making flying pizzas a possibility," Tom Hatton, Master Brewer and founder of T + Biscuits, told NBC News.

A pizza delivering drone smells deliciously similar to the fabled TacoCopter — a taco delivery app which, to the Internet's disappointment, ended up being just a concept design — but Hatton insists the "DomiCopter" is the real deal. "We're serious about it," he said.

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...

AIDS LifeCycle 2013 Kicks Off in San Francisco: VIDEO

As Ari noted yesterday, the AIDS/LifeCycle ride kicked off a 545-mile, 7-day bike ride from San Francisco to Los Angeles that raises funds for the San Francisco AIDS Foundation (SFAF) and the HIV/AIDS-related services of the Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Center (LAGLC).

Riders raised a record $14.2 million. Towleroad is happy to debut this clip from the opening ceremonies.

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...