President’s Day Weekend was coming to a close last night but we had a fresh new episode of The Agenda with Joe Solmonese leading into the work week.

At the top of the show we always look at the news of the day so this week we hosted HRC Field Director Marty Rouse. He discussed a new report out of New Jersey that says the recently enacted civil unions have not lived up to their promise of equality for same-sex couples.

Switching gears, the Oscars are almost here so we welcomed Gregg Goldstein of The Hollywood Reporter. He filled us in on the Academy Award favorites and which films may turn out to be spoilers.

Then we tackled some politics and specifically the issues of health care and retirement security. AARP along with SEIU, the Business Roundtable and the National Federation of Independent Business have created a campaign called Divided We Fail. HRC recently signed on to the coalition and Campaign Director Lisa Davis was our guest to discuss it.

Back to entertainment, this weekend Broadway star Idina Menzel will perform at HRC’s New York Gala Dinner so she sat down last week with Agenda Producer Michael Cole to talk about her new album, her upcoming appearance at the dinner and what it’s like being married to Taye Diggs. Listen in.

We were thrilled to welcome a special guest last night who in 2001 became the first openly gay man confirmed by the Senate to be a U.S. Ambassador. Michael Guest was appointed by President Bush to serve in Romania and after his tenure was over, he became an outspoken critic of the way same-sex couples are treated in the Foreign Service. Listen in.

Finally, we wrapped up with some politics with Dana Houle, contributing editor at DailyKos. The Agenda has hosted a number of GLBT bloggers but we thought it was time to get a perspective on the news of the day through a non-gay yet progressive lens. Listen in.

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