lgbt

In Maine, advocates of marriage equality suffered a setback in this past election, where voters overturned a decision by the state legislature to legalize gay marriage. Thousands of volunteers, both Maine residents and passionate out-of-staters, worked countless hours on the campaign, going door to door and making phone calls in an attempt to convert popular support in the state to votes.

Hope. It was the word for the Obama campaign, epitomized by the famous Shepard Fairey poster, with eyes uplifted, bright primary colors declaring that Americans believed in something good again. Last year on election day, we discussed the election and the future of America; hoping for an Obama victory and with it some restoration of the things we'd lost under Bush. This year, we look back with some of our guests from that day on what they said then and what they think now.

In a special one-hour show, we convene two panels of GRITtv regular guests to talk about these questions, the election results, and what progressives need to do better going forward into 2010. Joining us are Katrina vanden Heuvel and Chris Hayes of The Nation, Jehmu Greene of the Women's Media Center and formerly of Rock the Vote, James Rucker of Color Of Change, Danny Schechter of News Dissector, Jane Hamsher of FireDogLake, Ron Reagan and Mark Green of Air America, and Esther Armah of WBAI.

The National Equality March on the D.C. mall Oct. 11 drew one hell of a crowd. If for-profit media had given each equality marcher the air time dedicated to the 60,000 or so teabaggers that came to D.C. a month ago, they'd still be hogging the airwaves, dawn to dusk. Most reports estimate Oct. 11's turnout at 100-200,000. We might have learned that the march was organized by locally-focused, nationally-connected activists representing every race, class and faith.Imagine what we'd learn, given half a chance.