Watch: Obama Remarks on Passage of Hate Crimes Law

President Obama made remarks late today on the Matthew Shepard & James Byrd, Jr. Hates Crimes Prevention Bill, which he signed into law earlier this afternoon.

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...

Cyndi Lauper Lauds Passage of Hate Crimes Prevention Bill

Towleroad has received a statement from Cyndi Lauper praising passage of the hate crimes bill, which President Obama will sign into law tomorrow.

"As a straight ally and as a person with many lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender family members, friends and fans, I want to thank the Human Rights Campaign, Judy and Dennis Shepard and Senator Edward Kennedy for their leadership in the 11 year struggle to get the Matthew Shepard & James Byrd, Jr. Hates Crimes Prevention Bill enacted. FINALLY, with President Obama's signature, violent hate crimes against the LGBT community will be recognized and prosecuted by the Federal government. This is only the beginning, I believe that the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell and the Defense of Marriage Act, as well as the passage of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, will soon be here. Today, that light at the end of the tunnel for the LGBT civil rights movement is much brighter."

Rep. Gohmert (R-TX): Hate Crimes Bill Holding Soldiers Hostage

Last night on the House floor, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) attacked the Matthew Shepard hate crimes bill, which is attached to a defense appropriations bill. Gohmert says the hate crimes bill is holding soldiers hostage, preventing hate preachers from stating their opinions, and attacking the moral fabric of America.

Reps. Barney Frank, Tammy Baldwin, and Jerrold Nadler rebutted Gohmert's sickening diatribe.

Watch them all, AFTER THE JUMP... 

(via inlookout)

UPDATE: The House later defeated a motion to strip the hate crimes bill from the DoD appropriations bill.

Voice of Matthew Shepard's Killer to Feature in Laramie Epilogue

In August I posted about the 80-minute epilogue to The Laramie Project which was to open on the 11th anniversary of Matthew Shepard's death. Some new details: the show will be opening at more than 130 theaters simultaneously on October 12.

The AP reports that a major segment of the show features testimony from Aaron McKinney (above, center), whom gay actor/writer Greg Pierotti interviewed for more than 10 hours:

"According to the detailed notes taken by Pierotti and condensed into the new script, McKinney says he had been drawn to crime ever since childhood, feels sympathy for Shepard's parents and expresses regret that he let his own father down. 'As far as Matt is concerned, I don't have any remorse,' McKinney is quoted as saying in the script, which was provided to The Associated Press by the production company. McKinney, according to the script, reiterates his claim that the 1998 killing in Laramie, Wyo., started out as a robbery, but makes clear that his antipathy toward gays played a role. 'The night I did it, I did have hatred for homosexuals,' McKinney is quoted as saying. He goes on, according to the script, to say that he still dislikes gays and that his perceptions about Shepard's sex life bolstered his belief that the killing was justified. McKinney and his accomplice, Russell Henderson, targeted Shepard at a bar in Laramie in part because they assumed he was gay, according to the script. 'Well, he was overly friendly. And he was obviously gay,' McKinney is quoted as saying. 'That played a part ... his weakness. His frailty. And he was dressed nice. Looked like he had money.'"

Of Judy Shepard's ongoing work against hate crimes, McKinney says: "...she never shuts up about it, and it's been like 10 years."

Pierotti says he wanted to address whether or not the murder was a hate crime, a question raised by a sensationalist 20/20 segment by Elizabeth Vargas in 2004 claiming the murder was motivated by drugs.

Adds Pierotti: "He's perfectly comfortable acknowledging he doesn't like gay people, and for me it was unnerving to experience his lack of remorse. Yet I feel very protective of him — not in an apologist way, but I see he has a lot of complexity. ... As an artist, it's more interesting to dig into who this person is."

The New York performance, which will take place at Alice Tully Hall in Lincoln Center, will reportedly be connected to all the other performances by the internet with a live question-and-answer session following the debut.

Judy Shepard Recalls the Phone Call That Changed Everything

Newsweek has posted an excerpt of Judy Shepard's new memoir, The Meaning of Matthew: My Son's Murder in Laramie, and a World Transformed (Hudson River Press):

"But the phone call that Thursday morning wasn't from Matt. It was about him. When the man on the other end of the line announced who he was, an emergency-room doctor from Ivinson Memorial Hospital in Laramie, I went numb. I don't remember what he said, or what I did next. I'm not sure whether it was the ringing phone or my subsequent gasp that startled the still-sleeping Dennis. Whatever it was that woke him, Dennis took the phone from me and then, after a seemingly endless silence, made a noise—a sort of helpless and mournful groan—that I'd never heard before and haven't heard since. Coming as it did from my husband, a man whose reserved manner is as typically masculine and Western as his Wrangler jeans and cowboy boots, the moan confirmed my worst fears."

Read the full excerpt here.

WaPo Columnist Richard Cohen Rails Against Hate Crime Laws

Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen calls hate crime laws a "folly" in the Washington Post:

"The real purpose of hate-crime laws is to reassure politically significant groups -- blacks, Hispanics, Jews, gays, etc. -- that someone cares about them and takes their fears seriously. That's nice. It does not change the fact, though, that what's being punished is thought or speech. ... I doubt that any group of drunken toughs is going to hesitate in their pummeling of a gay individual or an African American or a Jew on account of it being a hate crime. If they are not already deterred by the conventional penalties -- prison, etc. -- then why would additional penalties deter them? And if, in fact, they kept their mouths shut, refrained from the N-word or the F-word or the K-word, and simply made the beating or the killing seem one triggered by dissing or some other reason, then they would not be accused of hate -- merely of murder or some such trifle. If, though, they gave vent to their thoughts, they would be in for real trouble. For the most part, hate-crime legislation is just a sop for politically influential interest groups -- yet another area in which liberals, traditionally sensitive to civil liberties issues, have chosen to mollify an entire population at the expense of the individual and endorse discredited reasoning about deterrence."

Hate crime laws do not punish speech or thought. They punish criminal conduct as an expression of hateful bias against a class of people.