Tag Archives: civil rights

The day America went crazy

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With his family by his side, Barack Obama is s...
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Steven Thrasher, writing in The Village Voice, calls the date that white America went totally bonkers: January 20, 2009. The day that Obama was sworn in as President.  Great read.

As with other forms of dementia, the signs weren’t obvious at first. After the 2008 election, when former House majority leader Tom DeLay suggested that instead of a formal inauguration, Barack Obama should “have a nice little chicken dinner, and we’ll save the $125 million,” black folks didn’t miss the implication. References to chicken, particularly of the fried variety, have long served as a kind of code when white folks referred to black people and their gustatory preferences—and weren’t many of us already accustomed to older white politicians making such gaffes? But who among us sensed that it was a harbinger that an entire nation was plunging into madness?

Who didn’t chuckle, after all, the first time they heard that white people had doubts that Barack Obama had even been born in the United States and was therefore ineligible to be president? It sounded like one of those Internet stories in which some (usually white) writer does his best to prove something everyone knows to be true is actually the exact opposite. And you go along with it for a few paragraphs to see how long the writer can convince you that what you know is right is actually wrong.

DADT ruled unconstitutional

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US District Court Judge Virginia A. Phillips has ruled that the military’s “don’t ask don’t tell” policy violates the fundamental rights of service members and also undermines military readiness.  The Federal judiciary is recognizing more frequently that discrimination against gays is simply that, and that such discrimination has no rational basis.

The case was brought by the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay rights group.

Meanwhile, in the latest developments in the Federal case regarding gay marriage in California:

California’s highest court on Wednesday refused to order Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the state’s attorney general to appeal a federal ruling that overturned the state’s gay marriage ban.

The state Supreme Court denied a conservative legal group’s request to force the state officials to defend the voter-approved ban.

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Political quote of the day

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The First Amendment is not, so far as I know, a “privilege” earned by some Americans and not earned by others. It is a right. And it applies as powerfully to Muslims as to Catholics and Mormons and Jews and evangelicals alike.

There have been fewer more distressing experiences these past couple of months than witnessing the casual conflation of al Qaeda with American Muslims. It is obviously counter-productive in winning the war; but it is also a statement that even the most moderate of American Muslims are guilty until proven innocent. I’m sorry but I find that deeply unfair to a community that has, unlike some in Europe, integrated and succeeded in this country and deserves respect and inclusion, not suspicion and fear.

– Andrew Sullivan, on his blog today.

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Finally

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From Marc Ambinder at The Atlantic:

Ken Mehlman, President Bush‘s campaign manager in 2004 and a former chairman of the Republican National Committee, has told family and associates that he is gay.
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Mehlman acknowledges that if he had publicly declared his sexuality sooner, he might have played a role in keeping the party from pushing an anti-gay agenda.
“It’s a legitimate question and one I understand,” Mehlman said. “I can’t change the fact that I wasn’t in this place personally when I was in politics, and I genuinely regret that. It was very hard, personally.” He asks of those who doubt his sincerity: “If they can’t offer support, at least offer understanding.”
Better late than never.

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The stay is lifted

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From MSNBC:

The federal judge who overturned California’s same-sex marriage ban ruled Thursday that gay marriages can resume starting Aug. 18.

From the Judge’s order:

As it appears at least doubtful that proponents will be able to proceed with their appeal without a state defendant, it remains unclear whether the Court of Appeals will be able to reach the merits of proponents’ appeal,” Walker wrote.

“In light of those concerns, proponents may have little choice but to attempt to convince either the governor or the attorney general to file an appeal to ensure jurisdiction.”

Meanwhile, Nate Silver at FiveThiryEight notes that public opinion in favor of same-sex marriage is shifting in favor very rapidly.

In April, 2009, when we last took a survey of gay marriage polls, we found that support for it had converged somewhere into the area of 41 or 42 percent of the country. Now, it appears to have risen by several points, and as I reported yesterday, it has become increasingly unclear whether opposition to gay marriage still outweighs support for it.

And even Glenn Beck believes that gay marriage is not a threat to America:

Mark Morford on Prop 8 case

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Read the whole thing, but here is an excerpt:

Argentina, at last check, is not yet writhing in flames. Canada, as far as I can see from my window, is still right up there, stoic and mild, smelling of pine trees and bitumen, watching lots of hockey, shooting guns, being Canadian. The Netherlands? Why, still crisp and clean, efficiently blonde as ever. It’s shocking, really.

After all, you’d think they’d be downright miserable. You’d think they’d be in country-wide group therapy, hating and hurling and spitting, maybe a few riots, some stabbings, panic in the streets, the very fabric of their various shell-shocked societies unraveling like Mel Gibson at a bat mitzvah.

In fact, it would appear that millions of people across a surprisingly large number of dashing, industrious countries all over the world — including Belgium, Spain, South Africa, Norway, Sweden, Portugal and even adorable little Iceland — are still not yet imploding, not yet suffering the furious wrath of God, not yet dying in unchecked anguish before our very eyes.

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What the hell is wrong with them? Didn’t they get the newsletter? Don’t they know how very wrong, sinful, sick and perverted they all so obviously are? Haven’t they heard the hoarse wails of the terrified Mormon elders, the raspy screams of the obsolete Vatican, the tightened bowels of confused fundamentalists of nearly every major religion worldwide, all of them absolutely positive that allowing certain kinds of consenting adults who love each other to get married will spell the end of civilization, families, innocence, the military, God’s bitter and judgmental love as we know it? Someone should send them a pamphlet.

Sociological quote of the day

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Here are some commonplace arguments against gay marriage: Marriage is an ancient institution that has always been defined as the union of one man and one woman, and we meddle with that definition at our peril. Lifelong heterosexual monogamy is natural; gay relationships are not. The nuclear family is the universal, time-tested path to forming families and raising children.

These have been losing arguments for decades now, as the cause of gay marriage has moved from an eccentric- seeming notion to an idea that roughly half the country supports. And they were losing arguments again last week, when California’s Judge Vaughn Walker ruled that laws defining marriage as a heterosexual union are unconstitutional, irrational and unjust.

These arguments have lost because they’re wrong. What we think of as “traditional marriage” is not universal. The default family arrangement in many cultures, modern as well as ancient, has been polygamy, not monogamy. The default mode of child-rearing is often communal, rather than two parents nurturing their biological children.

– Ross Douthat, conservative columnist, in an op-ed in the New York Times.

Ted Olson’s turn

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Now Ted Olson delivers a smack down to Chris Wallace on Fox News:

The take away:

Well, would you like your right to free speech? Would you like Fox’s right to free press put up to a vote and say well, if five states approved it, let’s wait till the other 45 states do? These are fundamental constitutional rights. The Bill of Rights guarantees Fox News and you, Chris Wallace, the right to speak.

David Boies calls out Tony Perkins on Face the Nation

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Check out how well a bigot like Tony Perkins (of the so-called “Family Research Council”) fares when faced with a direct challenge to produce facts, not mere claims.

“But when they come into court and they have to support those opinions and they have to defend those opinions under oath and cross-examination, those opinions just melt away. And that’s what happened here. There simply wasn’t any evidence, there weren’t any of those studies. There weren’t any empirical studies. That’s just made up. That’s junk science. It’s easy to say that on television. But a witness stand is a lonely place to lie. And when you come into court you can’t do that.”

California moves to resume same-sex marriages

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While the judge in the Prop 8 trial has at least temporarily stayed his opinion, thereby preventing same-sex marriage for the time being, the Governor and Attorney General of California (Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Democratic Attorney General Jerry Brown)  have filed motions seeking a lifting of the stay so that the State can resume same-sex marriages while the case is on appeal. The Governor’s motion is here. From the Governor’s motion:

The Administration believes the public interest is best served by permitting the Court’s judgment to go into effect, thereby restoring the right of same-sex couples to marry in California. Doing so is consistent with California’s long history of treating all people and their relationships with equal dignity and respect. Conversely, the Administration submits that staying the Court’s judgment pending appeal is not necessary to protect any governmental or public interest. As the Court has pointed out, California has already issued 18,000 marriage licenses to same-sex couples without suffering any resulting harm. Government officials can resume issuing such licenses without administrative delay or difficulty. For these reasons, the Administration respectfully requests that the Court deny defendant-intervenors’ motion for stay.

Good for them.

A Republican reaction?

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Here is a concrete example of how the far right Republicans will respond in this electoral year the demise of Proposition 8 in California. Blatant, no-holds barred, God-fearing homophobia. A TV advertisement by a Georgia Republican running for Governor.  Will anyone in the party stand up for equal rights, other than the noble Ted Olsen.

Has the President lost his mind?

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President Obama remains opposed to same-sex marriage, bit claims to support equal rights for gay citizens.

Here is a statement from David Axelrod:

The president does oppose same-sex marriage, but he supports equality for gay and lesbian couples, and benefits and other issues, and that has been effectuated in federal agencies under his control.

Axelrod also says that the President “opposed” Prop 8. Prop 8 banned same-sex marriages in California. Nothing less nothing more. If the President opposes a ban on same sex marriages, how can he oppose allowing same sex marriages? It doesn’t even make logical sense.

The truth has increasingly become clear. The President of the United States simply does not favor true equality for gay citizens. Period. It sounds like he is advocating separate but equal. Shameful.

Wonkette’s take:

People who care about gay rights would like Obama to support gay marriage. People who hate gay rights would like Obama to be shipped back to Kenya in a Kool-Aid pitcher. But Obama wants to get married to both the gay rights people and the anti-gay rights people, so he basically punts on the issue and tries to make both sides love him. But neither will.

Obama thought Proposition 8 was bad because it was “divisive and mean spirited,” Axelrod said. So denying people gay marriage is wrong. But giving people gay marriage is also wrong.