It is my understanding that the Supreme Court’s edict banning airing would have been for the “during trial” distribution of video, and not “until the end of all times”.

Being that the purpose of the appeal is for Judicial Review and not allowing for additional testimony (generally), and in so much that the Appellate Judicial Panel is privy to all materials and records of the initial trial to include video, Walker’s modest review of the video in this manner and forum will render it completely ineffectual in the overall outcome of the appeals process.

And then there is Maggie Gallagher, the omnipresent public face of NOM. Wouldn’t it be reasonable to expect that she has enormous expertise on marriage? Why didn’t she testify.

It looks like they only found one witness who was dumb enough not to realize that the arguments against SS marriage are nonsense.

history will be much kinder to wasllace. He, at least, repented.

I think that they see this in the context of holiness and hedonism.

That he is gay may just be incidental; if he kept that quiet and just lived the life of a eccentric but charming bachelor then his judgment wouldn’t be considered de facto biased. But that he doesn’t feel that it is shameful means that he has taken sides – he’s chosen hedonism and therefore is biased in all holiness v. hedonism conflicts.

To them, that the judge identifies as gay is not an aspect of his life. It is an ideological affiliation. He has chosen to join a group and adopt its values.

To them, an equal comparison would not be a black judge hearing a case involving civil rights. Rather, they see it like a judge who is a dues-paying member and volunteer for the NAACP hearing a case involving the NAACP itself.

They are wrong, of course. But that is their mindset.

As for what they deserve… I wouldn’t worry. History will be about as kind to Maggie Gallagher as it has been to George Wallace or Anita Bryant.

Never mind that as stated, Prop. 8 supporters had no evidence, qualified witnesses, nor facts to support their case.

But blaming gay people for losing it, blaming gay people for courts that favor Constitutional principle (and punishing them if they do such as in IA)and not really favoring gay people and trying to conceal in what way they lost the case, is truly very evil.

They deserve to have their hypocrisy and lack of courage come back to bite them, and hard.

It always amazes me just how week and ineffectual is the god of theocrats.

Now if they marched around, say, Minneapolis, seven times and ‘the walls came a’tumbling down’, then I’d really want to know more about their deity. But the one they are trying to sell me seems to be a petty dictator (maybe he works part-time at the DMV?), and I very much prefer my God, thanks.

But wouldn’t you expect that these people (who are obedient to God and doing His work) wouldn’t need to resort to such tactics to achieve their goals? I would expect God and His finest followers to have much higher ethical standards. Wouldn’t you expect a god’s will to be supported by solid facts, evidence, and reasoning? Or, does God say, “I don’t concern my glorious awesome self with such trivialities as facts, evidence, and reasoning. Those things are only for Satan’s people.”

People really do invent the god who matches their own personalities and character, don’t they?

1) The trial was attended by the public, official transcripts of the trial are publicly available, and I believe that all the statements are attributed to the witnesses by name. Even something that was stricken from the record could still be recalled by anyone who actually attended the trial. So, to the best of my understanding, essentially nothing on those tapes should be considered a serious secret. At most, the anti-gay side may fear that people will have a greater reaction to actual video (or they may, quite rationally, fear that such video would go viral and be seen by a great many more people).

But honestly, all the witnesses are already identified. To my knowledge, none have been the target of violence, and it’s unlikely that they will be, given that their only two witnesses gave such lukewarm testimony. I honestly cannot see where the danger is in putting cameras in courtrooms, with the exception of occasions when a person present would have to remain anonymous, or the camera would otherwise reveal important information protected by court order or which would have to be kept off the public record.

2) Let’s recall why the tape would be bad for their cause and not ours. We have a very large number of people who care intensely about equal rights. They have a handful of people who are spreading hateful prejudice, along with a large number of people who vote against LGBT rights mostly because of a lack of consideration or understanding of the issue, combined with the usual bias most people have towards the status quo, the traditional, and the familiar.

More publicity would mean that they lose some of their advantage in people who are misinformed, uninformed, or just haven’t thoroughly considered what marriage equality means yet. Not to mention that we dominated the trial itself. We had the evidence, and they did not.

3) I was actually surprised to find that Walker had shown that tape, since I expected it to be stowed away indefinitely (perhaps being unlocked decades hence, in a historical autopsy of the case). Now there are copies of the audio on YouTube (admittedly, only a few seconds out of several days’ worth of footage).

I honestly don’t know what to make of the legal status of that action. On the one hand, I would certainly expect Judge Walker to be acting within what is legally allowed. On the other hand, I have no idea how this action could be legal. I guess I’ll have to wait for more news.