MOST NOTEWORTHY: Third Wave, DryShips and Hil-Rom Holdings were among today's noteworthy initiations:

• Third Wave (NASDAQ: TWTI) was initiated with a Buy, target $12 at Deutsche which said the company is compelling small-cap opportunity in molecular diagnostics with an $1B-plus opportunity in the HPV market.
  
• DryShips (NASDAQ: DRYS) was initiated with an Outperform, target $110 at Credit Suisse, which is positive on the company's growth opportunity and is bullish on dry bulk rates into 2009.
  
• Hil-Rom Holdings (NYSE: HRC) was initiated with an Outperform at Oppenheimer which believes 2H08 will be an inflection point for Hill-Rom, with revenue, margin expansion, and earnings growth all beginning to accelerate. The firm believes that the company's performance will improve due to its efforts to complete spending on R&D, reinvigorate its brand, and find low-cost sourcing and manufacturing alternatives.

OTHER INITIATIONS:

• Imperial Tobacco (NYSE: ITY) coverage was resumed with a Buy at Merrill Lynch.
  
• ICU Medical (NASDAQ: ICUI) was initiated with a Buy, target $35 at Jesup & Lamont, which is positive on the company's valuation, strong balance sheet, growth in oncology and expectations for gross margin improvement.

On the ABC show Brothers and Sisters, one of the main characters (a brother) is gay, and currently dating a soap star. The soap star is keeping his yen for a boyfriend a secret at all costs as he's sure his fans will revolt if he's exposed. I keep wondering if the plotline is a serious examination of daytime television fans and their bigotry or the writers are just poking fun at the ridiculousness of any star in today's climate hiding homosexuality. It seems that many stars have increased their bankability by coming out, from Ellen DeGeneres to her gorgeous girlfriend, Portia de Rossi.

And today, the news that Cyndi Lauper is launching her 'True Colors Music Tour' to support gay and lesbian equality appeared in my inbox and I have to wonder, is Cyndi Lauper gay? (As far as I know, she's not; she's been married to a man for years and they appear happily heterosexual.) Or is her association with the gay audience simply a marketing tool?

Let me start out by saying that (a) I support GBLT rights and only got the news because I had clicked to back gay marriage and (b) I really, really want to go to Cyndi Lauper's tour. But the point is that I've been beginning to wonder if being gay has gone from anachrony to characteristic, and an attractive characteristic at that, kind of like being from a small town in Oklahoma, or being connected in the tabloids with the hottest, youngest actor of the moment.

ExxonMobil, says the Human Rights Campaign, is a big zero. A new report out from HRC, the nation's largest lesbian and gay political organization, scores American companies on how well they are reaching out to their gay and lesbian workforce, and ExxonMobil finds itself at the bottom of the list.

According to the report from HRC, companies are scored in handful of areas. For a company to receive a perfect score they must demonstrate that they have policies in place for banning discrimination based on sexual orientation, they must provide partner benefits, offer diversity training, and advertise to the gay community. Several companies that we follow closely on BloggingStocks scored perfect 100's in the report. They include Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F), Apple Computer Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Dell Inc. (NASDAQ:DELL). Time Warner Inc. (NYSE:TWX) came in with an 85 score.

As For ExxonMobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM)... well, the picture isn't so pretty. Exxon managed to be one of only three companies in the report that came in with a score of zero. Why the poor score? The company did not even offer minimal benefits or workplace protection for gay employees. When asked about the report ExxonMobil spokesman Russ Roberts stated that Exxon relied on used the "definition of spouse used in federal legislation, which has the effect of limiting coverage to heterosexual couples," but also added that XOM had in place "written policies [that] prohibit discrimination or harassment for any reason, including sexual orientation." Apparently that wasn't enough to give them any points for good measure. Only two other companies came in with zero scores: Midwestern retailer Meijer Inc. and Plano, Texas-based Perot Systems technology consultants.