New York Times December 13, 2011 By TARA SIEGEL BERNARD Since the federal government does not recognize same-sex marriage, such couples are viewed as strangers in many spheres of their financial lives. They need to file separate federal tax returns, for instance. And sometimes, that can come with certain advantages. Take the adoption tax credit. If you adopt your spouse’s child, you cannot claim the credit. But since same-sex married couples are...

  9.28.2011 – PRWEB.com American experts, a surrogate mother, French parents and academics weighed in on a topic that divides France, where surrogacy is still illegal. Instead of pros or cons, they concentrated on providing guidelines on how surrogacy can be carried out ethically. The ethical principles Dr. Doyle outlined include fully informing and protecting surrogates and donors from medical and psychological risks, treating them with dignity...

June 3, 2011 New York Times By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS LOS ANGELES (AP) — The case of the doctor who lost his license for helping “Octomom” bear the world’s largest-surviving brood of babies has rattled the field of fertility medicine — a $3 billion industry with little regulation. When the Medical Board of California revoked the license of Dr. Michael Kamrava on Wednesday, it was a rare outcome that came more than two years...

Michigan Messenger – By Todd A. Heywood | 05.11.11 After the state legislature failed to override the Michigan Civil Service Commission decision to offer insurance benefits to unmarried partners of state employees, Republicans are trying a different tack. Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette has filed a lawsuit to void that decision. The key issue here is whether the state’s anti-gay marriage amendment, passed in 2004, forbids such benefits...

Married couples will have preference when it comes to adopting children under a new measure signed into law by Gov. Jan Brewer on Monday. Senate Bill 1188, which was sponsored by Sen. Linda Gray, R-Glendale, would require an adoption agency to give primary consideration to adoptive placement with a married man and woman, with all other criteria being equal. Agencies are also supposed to consider other factors, including possible placement with relatives,...

Washington Post – 4.20.11 By Anita Kumar RICHMOND — The State Board of Social Services has voted overwhelmingly against new adoption rules that some say would allow same-sex couples to adopt in the state for the first time. In a 7-2 vote Wednesday afternoon, the board opted against the new rules, first proposed by former governor Tim Kaine. In Virginia, only married couples and single men and women, regardless of sexual orientation,...

By Anita Kumar, Monday, April , 8:38 PM Washington Post RICHMOND — Republican Gov. Robert F. McDonnell is considering whether to try to derail proposed regulations developed by his Democratic predecessor that would for the first time allow gay couples to adopt children in Virginia. McDonnell has less than two weeks to act on the regulations that would force state-licensed private and church-run agencies to allow unmarried couples — heterosexual...

Mombian – 2.24.2011 What a day yesterday, hmm? The Department of Justice says it won’t defend the Defense of Marriage Act. Not to mention that Maryland is edging closer to marriage equality (expect a final vote in the next day or two), and civil unions are now legal in Hawaii. (That is, the governor has signed the bill—it doesn’t go into effect until January 1, 2012.) Equality marches on, but it hasn’t been and still won’t be an easy...

Mombian – January 4, 2011 I’m still recovering from the holidays, so let’s be different and start with some celebrity news before diving into politics: Celebrity News Elton John and his partner David Furnish are now proud parents. “Elton John and David Furnish became first-time fathers on Christmas after welcoming a baby boy via a surrogate,” says the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Just once, though, I want to see a newspaper headline...

November 6, 2010 New York Times By ERIK ECKHOLM HELENA, Mont. — Alarmed by evidence that gay and lesbian students are common victims of schoolyard bullies, many school districts are bolstering their antiharassment rules with early lessons in tolerance, explaining that some children have “two moms” or will grow up to love members of the same sex. But such efforts to teach acceptance of homosexuality, which have gained urgency after several well-publicized...