Joe was back in the studio with Mary for this week’s show — and just in time for his own birthday. To get the party started we surprised the birthday boy with special guest Carrie Megginson, horoscope writer for Metro Weekly magazine, to see what the stars held in store for our favorite Sagittarius.

Turning to more earthly speculation, we invited New York Times reporter Patrick Healy onto the show to talk about Hilary Clinton, her possible presidential run and other gossip related to the 2008 elections. Take a minute to listen in here part 1 and part 2.

Fall 2006 spelled victory for fair-minded political candidates across the country, and Joe took some time to sit down with out lesbian U.S. Rep. Tammy Baldwin to discuss what the election results means for the GLBT community and America as a whole.

The holiday movie season is in full force and Logan Hill of New York Magazine dropped in to give us a preview of what is coming out in the next few weeks. Listen in here.

It has been 25 years since the AIDS epidemic began. One aspect of the fight against HIV/AIDS that doesn’t get enough attention is that in this country, black gay men continue to be the group hardest hit by the epidemic. Two longtime activists — Cornelius Baker, the national policy advisor for the newly formed National Black Gay Men’s Advocacy Coalition, and Ronald Johnson, deputy executive director for policy of the AIDS Action Council — joined us to talk about AIDS in the black community and what they are doing to create positive change. Listen to the discussion in parts 1 and 2.

This week we jumped into the holiday season and our pre-Thanksgiving show turned out to be a cornucopia of goodies. While Joe was away on vacation we brought in Democratic Analyst for MSNBC and good friend, Hilary Rosen, to co-host the show with Mary.

November 20th marks Transgender Day of Rememberance and we had special guest Mara Keisling, key transgender rights leader and founder of the National Center for Transgender Equality, to discuss the significance of this occasion. To hear more, click here.

As shopping season kicks off, we decided to provide a little guidance on how to use your spending power to support the GLBT community. We started off this segment with a short conversation between Mary and Whole Foods spokesman Scott Simons. Then Eric Bloem, Associate Director HRC’s Workplace Project joined us in-studio to talk about HRC’s new buyers guide and some of the most (and least) GLBT-friendly companies of 2007. To visit the HRC’s Buying for Equality Guide, and to download your own free copy please click here.

Adoption was our next topic of discussion and guest producer, Mark Shields, had conversations with two gay men about their experiences with adoption and foster parenting. Then we had Janice Goldwater, Founder and Executive Director of Adoptions Together, and Ellen Kahn, Director of HRC’s Family Project, join us to go over some of the primary issues that GLBT people face when adopting.

Out magazine just released a list of 100 people who “rocked 2006” and we had their Editor in Chief, Aaron Hicklin, to dish about who was in it and why listen in here.

Finally, to whet our appetites for this Thursday, we talked to Josie Smith Malave, out lesbian contestant on Bravo’s reality show, Top Chef. Josie talked a little bit about being on the show and then gave us some excellent cooking ideas for a knock-out Thanksgiving dinner. Listen.

The elections have been a pre-holiday feast for Joe and Mary, and this week’s show proves that the leftovers are sometimes the best part.

We started out the night by grabbing some election highlights from HRC Political Director Sam Smoot and Field Director Marty Rouse.

Turning to Florida, Joe talked to Congressman-Elect Ron Klein, who will represent Fort Lauderdale. Klein, who was the Democratic candidate in this hard-fought race against 13-term Republican incumbent Clay Shaw, has a long history of support for GLBT issues and was an HRC-endorsed candidate.

A.B. Stoddard of The Hill, who’s been a regular on “Hardball,” joined us for the big election overview. Then we turned our attention to the victories in Arizona and Massachusetts, where anti-marriage ballot questions were defeated. Steve May, co-chair of the Arizona Human Rights Fund, and Marc Solomon, campaign director of MassEquality, joined us to discuss both of these victories and what they mean for the future. Listen here.

One of our favorite guests, Mary Ann Akers of Roll Call, returned to give us some of the dirt on what’s abuzz in the halls of Congress. Listen here.

We wrapped up our election special with our own form of political hardball by pairing two of the most observant and opinionated viewers of this election cycle: Hilary Rosen, Democratic analyst for MSNBC, and Andrew Sullivan, conservative commentator and blogger of The Daily Dish and author of the new book The Conservative Soul: How We Lost It, How to Get It Back. Listen in now to part one or part two.