(Writing and reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis)

 Singer Melissa Etheridge has been an outspoken advocate for gay and lesbian rights. But this week the openly lesbian singer had an encounter with a man who has received no love from the gay community, the Rev. Rick Warren. He opposes gay marriage and President-elect Barack Obama’s choice of Warren to give the inauguration invocation has put both men in the crosshairs of controversy. But despite all that, Etheridge wrote in an online blog post on Monday at the Huffington Post that, to her own surprise, she found out that Warren was … her fan.
 
Etheridge and Warren met because he was scheduled to give the keynote address at an inter-faith event organized by a Muslim advocacy group, and Etheridge was to perform there.
    
Etheridge confesses on her blog that at first she thought about canceling her appearance at the event, and then she talked to Warren on the phone. 
 
“He had most of my albums from the very first one. What? This didn’t sound like a gay hater, much less a preacher,” Etheridge wrote.
 
She also reported that Warren said he struggled with Proposition 8, the ballot measure that California voters ultimately approved in November eliminating the right of same-sex couples to marry. It’s because of Warren’s support for eliminating that right that he is under fire these days.
    
Etheridge is in a committed relationship with a woman and together the two are raising children. She has repeatedly criticized Proposition 8, going so far as to declare last month that she would not pay her California taxes because the state was not treating her like an equal citizen by denying her the right to marry her partner. But she has nothing but good things to say about Warren, who she described as a thoughtful man of the cloth.
    
“When we met later that night, he entered the room with open arms and an open heart. We agreed to build bridges to the future,” she wrote.
    
Etheridge is not the first member of the gay and lesbian community to call for calm in the Warren controversy. But she is one of the most prominent lesbian figure to extend an olive branch to Warren. Will it succeed in calming tensions before the inauguration? We’ll see.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis)

For months now, Lindsay Lohan has been out in public with gal pal DJ Samantha Ronson, and speculation has swirled around whether the pair are involved in a love affair. Along the way, Lohan has made vague statements about the nature of their relationship that many celebrity watchers have taken as confirmation the two are more than just friends.
    
The most recent entry into the Lohan/Ronson guessing game is an interview Lohan gave to Harper’s Bazaar magazine in which The “Mean Girls” star was still guarded about their relationship.  Below is an excerpt from the interview in which she discusses the topic:

“…’I think it’s pretty obvious who I’m seeing,” Lindsay admits after much, much prodding. “I think it’s no shock to anyone that it’s been going on for quite some time. … She’s a wonderful person and I love her very much.”

“Has she previously been with a girl?  She laughs and says, ‘I don’t know. Maybe.’ Has she ever been embarrassed about being attracted to a woman? ‘No.’ Would she classify herself as bisexual? ‘Maybe. Yeah.’ Lesbian? ‘No.’ She goes on, ‘I don’t want to classify myself. First of all, you never know what’s going to happen — tomorrow, in a month, a year from now, five years from now. I appreciate people, and it doesn’t matter who they are, and I feel blessed to be able to feel comfortable enough with myself that I can say that.’  She sees herself getting married ‘eventually,’ but whether to a man or a woman, ‘I don’t know.’…” 

Lohan has dated men in the past, including reality star Calum Best and actor/singer Aaron Carter.

Why the interest?  In the gay community, Lohan being “out” is a big deal, if in fact she is a lesbian. (Apparently, from reading above, she doesn’t consider herself one). Hollywood now has many gay and lesbian stars who live their lives out of the closet, but the gay community in entertainment is still waiting for major talent to come out. Comedian Ellen DeGeneres is, for now, perhaps the biggest name to do so.

Comedian Ellen DeGeneres said she was “saddened beyond belief” at the decision by voters to ban the newly-won rights of gays and lesbians to marry in California.

But singer Melissa Etheridge sounds downright angry.

Etheridge,  47,  who did not get to marry her partner Tammy Lynn Michaels before the Nov 4 ballot,   suggested in a blog post that she would no longer pay her California state taxes because, as a lesbian, she did not now enjoy the same rights as as other Californians.

“Okay, so I am taking that to mean I do not have to pay my state taxes because I am not a full citizen,” Etheridge wrote.

DeGeneres and her longtime partner, actress Portia de Rossi, were among the roughly 18,000 gay or lesbian couples who married in California in the five-month honeymoon between same sex marriage becoming legal and then being banned in a ballot initiative known as Proposition 8.

The popular chat show host married de Rossi in August in the most high-profile same sex marriage since such unions were declared legal in California in May.

“I was saddened beyond belief. Here we just had a giant step toward equality and then on the very next day, we took a giant step away,” DeGeneres wrote on her website

“I believe one day a ‘ban on gay marriage’ will sound totally ridiculous. In the meantime, I will continue to speak out for equality for all of us,” she added.

California authorities say marriages of gays and lesbians between June and November will remain legal. Hundreds of gay rights activists held street protests in Los Angeles and San Francisco after the Prop 8 vote and have filed several lawsuits in a bid to overturn the decision.

Brad Pitt has donated $100,000 to fight California voters’ attempt to eliminate the rights of gay couples to marry.

Pitt’s donation to the No on Prop 8  campaign is the largest single donation so far by a celebrity to the bid to defeat the anti-gay marriage California ballot measure in November, organizers said.

“Because no one has the right to deny another their life even though they disagree with it, because everyone has the right to live the life they so desire if it doesn’t harm another, and because discrimination has no place in America,  my vote will be for equality and against Proposition 8,” Pitt said in a statement.

The California Supreme Court struck down a ban on marriage in May but state voters will decide in a voter referendum in November whether to abolish those new rights.

Chad Griffin, political strategist for the No on 8 campaign, said he hoped Pitt’s contribution would encourage other celebrities to put their hands in their pockets. “The entertainment industry should view this contribution as a challenge,” Griffin said.

Many lesbian and gay couples marrying in Califronia have asked friends and relatives to donate to the campaign instead of buying wedding gifts.

Chat show host Ellen DeGeneres and actress Portia de Rossi married in Beverly Hills in August and former “Star Trek” crew member George Takei married his long time partner Brad Altman in September.