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HOUSTON – The Houston City Council is currently considering an ‘equal rights’ ordinance which would allow men and women to use restrooms and shower rooms designated for the opposite sex, as long as they identify with the opposite gender. Houston Mayor Annise Parker, an open lesbian, is promoting an “Equal Rights Ordinance” designed to quell any discrimination in America’s fourth largest city—including any discrimination on the basis of “gender identity.” “Gender identity means an individual’s innate identification, appearance, expression or behavior as either male or female,” the most recent ordinance draft states, “although the same may not correspond to the...

FULL TITLE: Houston Mayor Annise Parker calls Phil Robertson a 'redneck wingnut' whose views are 'completely irrelevant' “I have never watched ‘Duck Dynasty,’ so I don’t think about it much at all,” Parker responded. “I’ve been a gay community activist since the mid-70s.

Annise Parker, the newly-elected happens-to-be-lesbian mayor of Houston was sworn in Monday and the opening prayer was given by ... Rev. Joel Osteen. Is your head spinning? Osteen heads the nation's most mega of evangelical non-denominational megachurches, Lakewood Church in Houston where about 45,000 people cycle through a revamped sports stadium for services every weekend. Osteen has been all over telling folks (Larry King, Whoopi Goldberg) for years that homosexuality is not "God's best." I presume he means "God's best choice" because otherwise I'm lost in the dropped or implied rest of the sentence. But "God's best" is phrase Osteen...

Houston elected an openly gay mayor. Inauguation live on C-Span. She was just sworn in with a female at her side.

When Parker finally appeared at 10:30, resplendent in a gold pantsuit and pearl necklace, a room jammed elbow-to-elbow with supporters erupted with a deafening cheer. Some were newcomers to political waters; some had been with her a dozen years ago when she claimed her first City Council seat. Election-night parties often are set pieces with familiar ear-splitting soundtracks -- her appearance was preceded by the endless refrains of "We Are Family" -- but if there was a difference to this occasion, it may have been the sense among some supporters that Parker's election was a step away from the political...

The landmark election Saturday of America's first big-city lesbian mayor in Houston represents more than just a milestone in identity politics. It also signals an unmistakable evolutionary step in national politics, one that provides further evidence of a trend that helped make Barack Obama president: growth-oriented communities like the Texas metropolis, rather than aging big cities or nostalgia-inducing small towns, are setting the course of the country's political direction. Houston is one of a set of fast-growing cities and expanding suburbs whose changing face and increasingly post-racial politics helped make Barack Obama president. Their politics are defined by some of...

<p>Houston became the largest U.S. city to elect an openly gay mayor, with voters handing a solid victory to City Controller Annise Parker after a hotly contested runoff.</p> <p>Parker defeated former city attorney Gene Locke with 53.6 percent of the vote Saturday in a race that had a turnout of only 16.5 percent.</p>

A lesbian candidate won Houston's mayoral election Saturday night, a vote that made the city the largest in the U.S. to ever have an openly gay mayor. "This election has changed the world for the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered community. Just as it is about transforming the lives of all Houstonians for the better, and that's what my administration will be about," City Controller Annise Parker told supporters after former city attorney Gene Locke conceded defeat. Parker got 53 percent of the vote. More than 152,000 residents turned out to cast ballots in the fourth largest U.S. city. The...

HOUSTON – The first openly gay person to be elected mayor of Houston says she hopes her victory in Saturday's election will change how the world views the city. Houston is the nation's fourth-largest city and the biggest to elect an openly gay mayor. Mayor-elect Annise Parker spoke Sunday at a press conference after defeating former city attorney Gene Locke with 53.6 percent of the vote in the hotly contested runoff election.

Houston, Texas has become the largest city in the United States to elect an openly gay mayor after City Controller Annise Parker was declared the winner of a runoff election tonight. Social conservatives fought her election, funding a campaign aimed at turning out likeminded voters to support her opponent, former city attorney Gene Locke. But Parker's endorsements from labor, police, women's, gay rights and other groups were echoed by the Houston Chronicle, the area's major daily newspaper, and her campaign ran a superior get-out-the-vote effort.

HOUSTON (AP) - Annise Parker has an unbeatable lead over Gene Locke in Houston's hotly contested mayoral election, meaning she will become the city's first openly gay mayor. The Harris County elections Web site says 53.62 percent of voters who turned out Saturday chose Parker. Her rival, former city attorney Gene Locke, was pitching to become the city's second black mayor.