During the interview, Cooper challenged Phelps to a race, with a few conditions to try and even out the playing field.

Phelps had to swim underwater, with no breathing, and could only use his legs. Cooper also got to dive in while Phelps could only push off the wall.

Plus, Phelps has not really been training since the games and is, for him, sort of out of shape.

WATCH: Anderson Cooper (In A Swimsuit) Races Michael Phelps

The YouTube video was an instant hit in the gay blogosphere.

Three Los Angeles police officers were shown on live television approaching a Proposition 8 protester who had broken through a police line. Officers then took the man down, hitting him with batons before arresting him.

The man was Kevin Miniter, 25, a gay activist. And in his first interview about the Nov. 5 incident, which was captured on video by a local TV news helicopter crew, Miniter told the Blade that events culminating in his arrest began earlier that day.See Beaten, arrested, held for two days

Chris Lee writes about film and pop culture for the Los Angeles Times and he sent over this, uh, unexpected take on “Transporter 3,” the action film that opened Wednesday. We may never watch the fire hose scene quite the same way…

Alas, the Transporter is gay no more.

In the trailer for “Transporter 3,” Jason Statham (in character as the tactiturn commando-turned-courier Frank Martin) is very clearly seen making out with sexy costar Natalya Rudakova –- a stunning development for anyone intimately acquainted with the car-chase-crazy, karate-tastic French-financed action franchise.

In 2005, Louis Leterrier, the director of “Transporter 2” (and also credited as “artistic director” of the first “Transporter”) told me he created a gay subtext for the character so as to avoid making a “Steven Seagal kind of movie.”

“If you watch the movie and you know he’s gay, it becomes so much more fun,” Leterrier said then. “It’s so great — the first gay action movie hero!” He continued: “Action fans in general are pretty homophobic. You see these tough guys who say, ‘ “The Transporter,” that’s such a great movie!’ If they only knew they’re really cheering for a new kind of action hero.”

See ‘The Transporter,’ gay action hero?
Los Angeles Times, CA

ALBANY — After a pledge from New York Democratic leaders that their party would legalize same-sex marriage if they won control of the State Senate this year, money from gay rights supporters poured in from across the country, helping cinch a Democratic victory.

But now, party leaders have sent strong signals that they may not take up the issue during the 2009 legislative session. Some of them suggest it may be wise to wait until 2011 before considering it, in hopes that Democrats can pick up more Senate seats and Gov. David A. Paterson, a strong backer of gay rights, would then be safely into a second term.

The question of how aggressively to proceed has touched off an intense debate among legislators and gay rights supporters about how ready the broader electorate is to embrace same-sex marriage, both in New York and across the country.

Many are still stung by California voters’ approval this month of a measure that reversed a court decision that gave gay and lesbian couples the right to marry. Heavy spending by church groups and others opposed to same-sex marriage helped the proposal win.

“We want to get there, but we want to get there the right way or else we risk setting ourselves back another decade,” said Senator Liz Krueger, a Democrat who represents the Upper East Side. “I think the California proposition and the recognition that entities with large amounts of money who oppose same-sex marriage have decided to be large players in this have a lot of people going back to the drawing board.”

See New York Democrats May Skip Gay Marriage Vote
New York Times, United States 

  Yuma’s The Amancio Project and The Yuma County Gay Rights Meetup recently met with other gay rights organizations around the state to discuss how to next proceed in light of the passage of Prop 102 in Arizona and similar issues across the United States.

  The passage of Proposition 102 created a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriages in Arizona. As a result, the constitution now states a union of one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in this state.

  “It is not a matter of whether same-sex marriages are right or wrong, who cares?” said Michael H. Baughman, founder of The Amancio Project. “It is a matter of putting something into a constitution that denies people rights.”See Gay rights in Yuma County take a proud step forward
Yuma Sun,

The LA Times has a follow-up story. A transcript of the event will be posted here within a day.

The L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center is hosting a virtual town hall meeting tonight to discuss Proposition 8 from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Pacific Time. The forum will be hosted here and moderated by journalist Karen Ocamb.

Answering questions will be Geoff Kors from Equality California, Lorri L. Jean from the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center, Shannon Minter from the National Center for Lesbian Rights, Rev. Eric Lee from Southern Christian Leadership Conference Los Angeles, John A. Perez, Assembly Member-elect from California’s 46th district, and Steve Smith, No on 8 campaign consultant.

See Virtual Town Hall meeting on Prop 8

The opposition to Prop. 8 is trying a new, less divisive approach to tilt public opinion in favor of gays, and, by extension, gay marriage. Two gay men in West Hollywood conceived the Day Without a Gay, slated for December 10 to coincide with International Human Rights Day. With the slogan “Fight the H8 with love,” the movement asks that LGBT folks “call in gay” to work that day and instead volunteer at a humanitarian organization. (See their website here.)

Co-founder of the gay day, Sean Hetherington, a personal trainer and stand-up comedian, drew inspiration from a column by L.A. Times writer Joel Stein, suggesting a day when all gays would stay home from work and not buy anything to measure their true social and economic impact in this country. It was modeled after the general protest of Latinos in 2006, who skipped work for mass marches demanding immigration reform.

But Hetherington thought that rather than just staging a polarizing protest, the gay community could boost society as well as their own image by volunteering, especially in those communities that supported Prop. 8. “Hey, maybe the reason you’re voting this way is you don’t know how compassionate we are as people,” he says. “There’s something to be said for people knowing this.”

See Coming Soon: Day Without a Gay
SF Weekly Blogs, CA

churches in case they offend gay worshippers.

They have been told by their bishops not to assume that every churchgoer is a heterosexual and to reflect this ‘in language and conversation’.

‘Remember that homophobic jokes and asides can be cruel and hurtful  -  a careless word can mean another experience of rejection and pain,’ say the bishops in a leaflet advising priests and worshippers how to be more welcoming to gay people.

Be careful not to offend gay worshippers, priests warned
Daily Mail, UK

Demonstrators outside a Mormon temple in Mesa Friday evening were reacting to the passage of Proposition 102, which defined marriage as a union strictly between a man and a woman in the state of Arizona.  Gay-rights activists know that Proposition 102 has passed, still they say they won’t give up the fight to educate and maybe change some minds.

The annual lighting of the lights at the Mormon temple in Mesa was Friday night. It draws thousands every year — an audience gay-rights activists came out to reach.

See Gay-rights activists protest outside Mormon temple in Mesa AZFamily

As many may recall, Matt Foreman, the former executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, made waves in February when he told the Creating Change conference in Detroit that HIV/AIDS was a “gay disease.” Statistics support Foreman’s assertion, with nearly 70 percent of cases in Michigan found in the men who have sex with men category. So with World AIDS Day around the corner, Between The Lines thought it might be pertinent to provide a simple list of things you can do to help stop HIV here in Michigan.

10. Make a commitment today as someone who cares about the LBGT community that HIV/AIDS is your problem, whether your are HIV positive or not. The end of the epidemic begins with everyone effected and affected by the epidemic taking part in the solution.

9. Host a fundraiser for your local AIDS service organization. Those funds will go to vital programs like anonymous and confidential HIV testing, prevention outreach, medication support, medical case work, food assistance for persons with HIV and dozens of other services offered by these vital community organizations. Many of these programs are being downsized or worse, cut, as a result of financial constraints from the economic crisis and shrinking government and private granting agencies.

8. Volunteer at the local AIDS service organization. Take an hour a week and help that organization file, pass out literature, distribute condoms or work in their food bank. While that hour is only an hour to you, AIDS service organizations can only survive with your assistance.

7. Promise to tell one friend or family member a day about HIV/AIDS and its impact in the world, America and right here in Michigan. Pass this list of things to do on to them, so they too can help be part of the solution.

See BTL Editorial: Ten things you can do to help stop the HIV epidemic …
pride source.com