Box Turtle Bulletin

NOM’s Special Right

NOM has decided to ban a contributor to one of its blogs.  Not a commenter, mind you (that would be nothing new), but a contributor, an official NOM blogger:

We at the Ruth blog have decided to no longer allow Ari to have posting privileges over here.  His sarcasm has gone over the line and we don’t care to be associated with it.  Those who are interested in hearing what Ari has to say can find him at his own blog.  We will stick to reporting on all aspects of the marriage issue in a civil way.

This Ari has recently called gay activists “the most loathsome people in the world.” In the same post, he declared that folks who want discrimination laws enforced “should not be able to go out in the streets for fear of being spat upon by decent people.” The post was removed, but not before NOM took some heat for it.

The irony is so delicious I want to smear it on toast and eat it for lunch.

NOM’s been on a crusade (and fundraising mission) lately about people who are persecuted for their anti-gay views.

• Gerald Buell, a teacher who called committed same-sex relationships a “cesspool” that make him “almost throw up,” vowing (and this is important) to teach “God’s truth” in his public school classes.
• Viki Knox, a teacher who says homosexuality is “a perverted spirit that has existed from the beginning of creation” that “breeds like cancer,” declaring (and this important), “THAT’S WHAT I TEACH AND PREACH!” (her caps, not mine).
• Frank Turek, a private consultant who publishes material characterizing gays as immoral, depraved, America-hating people comparable to murderers and rapists, who reduce their children to trophies and cannot love their partners. And then he presumes (and this is important) to teach workshops on leadership — and team-building — to companies that employ gays and lesbians.

NOM has championed these poor victims, all of whom play ball in the same park as Ari, all of whom have made their public statements relevant to their jobs. NOM has denounced alleged attempts by the evil gay mafia to “silence” them. NOM has declared it to be persecution, a violation of liberty, for an organization to decide someone’s rhetoric “has gone over the line and we don’t care to be associated with it.”

Unless of course the organization is NOM. In that case, apparently, it’s a special right they reserve for themselves.

Larry King’s Killer Pleads Guilty In Exchange for 21 Year Prison Term

Brandon McInerney (left), Lawrence King (right)

Brandon McInerney, who was a fourteen-year-old Oxnard Middle School student when he shot Larry King in school at point blank range in 2008, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder, voluntary manslaughter and the use of a fire arm in a plea deal which will result in a 21 year prison term in addition to time served. Under the terms of his plea deal, McInerney, who is now 17, will be released shortly before his 39th birthday. McInerney will be formally sentenced on December 19.

McInerney’s plea deal comes after a mistrial was declared in his first trial after jurors were unable to reach a verdict. They had deadlocked at 7 to 5 in favor of finding McInerney guilty of voluntary manslaughter, with the five holding out for either second or first degree murder.

The Gay and Lesbian Education Network’s Executive Director Eliza Byard applauded the plea deal:

“The plea deal announced today ends a tragic chapter in Ventura County. Holding Brandon McInerney accountable for his actions is necessary and right, but putting him behind bars does not solve the problems that led a boy to become a bully, and then a murderer. Homophobia and transphobia, compounded by the lack of counseling and other supports for struggling young people, resulted in Larry King’s death and the effective end of Brandon McInerney’s life. As adults and as a society, we must find the resolve to fix the broken systems that lost two young lives to hate and fear.

I echo Byard’s sentiments. I’ve always felt very uncomfortable with sending a fourteen-year-old to prison for the rest of his life. This, I think, strikes the right balance.

The Daily Agenda for Tuesday, November 22

Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears

TODAY’S BIRTHDAY:
Benjamin Britten. 1913. Fame came early to the English composer with his a cappella choral work, A Boy Was Born when he was just 21, and his 1945 opera Peter Grimes sealed his international reputation. His compositions were both prodigious and varied: working in orchestral, chamber, instrumental, choral and solo vocal. Much of his vocal work was written for tenor Peter Pears, who he met in 1937 and who became his musical inspiration and life partner. In 1939, Britten and Pears went to America, where his friendship with Aaron Copland inspired the development of Britten’s own work, notably his operetta Paul Bunyan.

Britten’s sexuality wasn’t the only thing controversial about him: he was was also a pacifist during World War II. On returning to Britain in 1942, he fought a long battle to wing the status of conscientious objector. That greatly hindered his ability to have his works performed in London both during and after the war. It also shaped his work; many of his operas throughout the 1950s and 1960s featured an “outside” character on the fringes of society. But as the decades wore on, Britten found that he was no longer an outsider, but an acclaimed 20th century composer. On July 2, 1976, he was awarded a life peerage as Baron Britten, just a few months before he died. Pears died ten years later, and was buried next to Britten at a churchyard in Aldeburgh.

If you know of something that belongs on the Agenda, please send it here. Don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

As always, please consider this your open thread for the day.

Single Father Laughing removes the asterisk

One of my great frustration is with Christian people who read Scripture and establish values and build character with an asterisk and footnotes. They truly believe that they are to love everyone* and that they are to abhor discrimination and bigotry towards anyone* and to work for a more just world for all*. Because, after all the Bible says to love your neighbor* as yourself.

* – except gay people

But if you’re gay then there are all sorts of “sanctioning immorality” and “putting a seal of approval on sin” and “not standing up for righteousness” issues that really must be considered, you know. So, well, it’s different.

Dan Pierce, who blogs as Single Father Laughing, isn’t buying it. And I’ll let his commentary I’m Christian, unless you’re gay speak for itself.

Read it.

And then he followed up with the responses he received in Powerful Responses to ‘I’m Christian, unless you’re gay.’

Dammit, Dan, I told myself I wouldn’t cry.

Pullen Baptist bans marriages

The little old men and women of Pullen Memorial Baptist Church in Raleigh, NC, have taken a position on same-sex marriage. By unanimous vote, they prohibited their pastor from conducting weddings.

All weddings, gay or straight. Or, at least until the state changes its laws. (newsobserver)

The congregants said in a formal statement that current North Carolina law – and the language proposed for a vote next year on an amendment to the state Constitution – discriminates against same-sex couples “by denying them the rights and privileges enjoyed by heterosexual married couples.”

“As people of faith, affirming the Christian teaching that before God all people are equal, we will no longer participate in this discrimination,” the church’s statement says.

They will continue to observe holy unions – mixed or same-sex – at this traditionally progressive church. But if you want the government’s stamp of approval on your marriage, you’ll have to get it elsewhere. Because Pullen Memorial isn’t in the discrimination business.

Booed Soldier Shares His Reaction

Capt. Stephen Hill (left) and his partner, Joshua Snyder, at home in Columbus, Ohio. (AP Photo/Jay LaPrete)

It was unprecedented in the annals of presidential politics: on September 23, an active-duty American soldier stationed on the front lines was loudly booed by audience members with nary an admonishment from any of the GOP presidential candidates on stage, and none of the Commander-In-Chief wannabees offer a word of thanks for his service. Now nearly two months later, Army Capt. Stephen Hill described to the Associated Press his reaction to that shocking display of disrespect:

“When the actual booing occurred, my gut dropped out, because my first inclination was, did I just do something wrong?” he said. “The answer, obviously, wasn’t very supportive of gay people, and there was a lot of fear of how the Army would take the question.”

He did not have to wait long to find out. At breakfast later that morning, the segment was playing on the chow hall television. Hill immediately tracked down his commander, who told him she had no problem with what he’d done but that she would need to run it up the chain of command. She later relayed the response.

“She said, ‘What the military’s most concerned with is that you are OK, because it’s a lot of pressure on you and we want to make sure if there is anything we can do to help,'” he recalled.

Hill also remembered that Santurum’s answer was solely about sex. Hill, who is married, found Santorum’s answer as adding to the insults.

“This is not about sex,” Hill said. “A special privilege is not hiding pictures in my house or God forbid, taking mortar fire again and not knowing if Josh will be recognized. I’m fighting every day to protect everyone’s rights as human beings, and it seems counterintuitive for me to be fighting for those rights and not have them.”

Capt. Hill and his husband, Joshua Snyder, have joined other same-sex military couples in suing the federal government for the same benefits as straight military couples.

Occupy Hate, a.k.a. Scott Lively

A contingent of the Occupy Springfield, Massachusetts, movement took time out to deliver a special message to Scott Lively’s drop-in coffee shop. Lively counters with a bit of preaching of his own.

[via Joe.My.God]

The Daily Agenda for Monday, November 21

Michael Sandy

TODAY IN HISTORY:
Michael Sandy’s Killers Sentenced. 2008. On October, 5, 2006, Michael Sandy, 29, was lured to a secluded beach in the New York area by three others who he met in an online chat room. When he arrived, he was pulled from his car and beaten. In trying to escape, he was chased onto a busy freeway where he was struck by an SUV. One of his attackers pulled him to the side of the road and went through his pockets before fleeing. Sandy was taken to the hospital, where he remained on life support for five days without regaining consciousness. His family removed him from life support one day before his 29th birthday.

The four men who were accused of planning the attack were arrested on hate crime charges. The police investigation showed that Sandy had been selected to be robbed because he was gay, believing a gay man would hesitate to resist the attack or report it to the police.

Michael’s death brought to the fore an ongoing debate over the intersection of race and sexuality in regards to community reactions to hate crimes. Los Angeles commentatorer Jasmyne Cannick noted,

Michael Sandy could have been anyone of us, and yet he was us. He was black. He was a black male and he was a black gay male. If Michael Sandy would have been heterosexual, would that have brought out the Reverend Jesse Jacksons and the Reverend Al Sharptons a black America? Would that have made it okay for the NAACP to get involved and for other black civil right groups to take notice? I’m beginning to think so.

…When Matthew Shepard was murdered, the world stopped. Why? Because whites across this country made that white gay boy’s death an issue for the media, politicians and community groups. Do we care enough to do the same? So again I ask, where’s the outrage?

Gary Timmins, 17, pleaded guilty to attempted robbery with a hate crime enhancement. As part of his plea agreement, he testified against his friends in exchange for a four-year prison sentence. John Fox, 20, who posed as a gay man in the internet chat room, was charged with manslaughter and attempted robbery as hate crimes and was sentenced to between 13 and 21 years in prison. Anthony Fortunato, 21, tried to avoid the hate crime enhancement by claiming he was gay himself. He was convicted of manslaughter as a hate crime and was sentenced to 7 to 21 years. Ilya Shurov, 21, pleaded guilty to manslaughter and attempted robbery as hate crimes and was sentenced to 17½ years. Before sentencing, Michael’s father, Zeke Sandy rose to address the court. “These hate crimes become a cancer; it’s a disease,” he said. “I don’t know why we have to go butcher one another because we don’t like what they are, who they are.”

If you know of something that belongs on the Agenda, please send it here. Don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

As always, please consider this your open thread for the day.

The Daily Agenda for Sunday, November 20

TODAY’S AGENDA:
Transgender Day of Remembrance: Everywhere. Today is the day set aside to remember those who have been murdered as a result of transphobia and to bring attention to the brutal violence endured by the transgender community. TDoR began in reaction to the brutal murder of Rita Hester, who was killed on November 28, 1998. Her murder resulted in the creation of the Remembering Our Dead web site and a candlelight vigil in 1999. In the first nine months of 2011, 116 transgender people have been killed around the world, according to Trans Murder Monitoring (TMM). They also say that there have been at least 681 murders in 50 countries since 2008. Observances for the Transgender Day of Rememberance typically consist of the reading of the names of those who have died because of their gender identity, expression, presentation or perception of gender variance. Observances are being held in cities all around the world. Click here to find an observance near you.

There will also be a virtual service conducted by the Church of the Larger Fellowship and the Standing on the Side of Love Campaign (both are part of the Unitarian Universalist Association). The online service will be hosted here at 9:00 p.m. EST. There is no RSVP or registration. Just click on the link.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
John Geddes Lawrence and Tyron Garner Arrested: 1998. One of the biggest steps toward gay equality, the end of America’s sodomy laws, began on November 20, 1998 when a neighbor called in a false report of someone with a gun “going crazy” at John Geddes Larence’s home in the Houston suburbs. (It would later emerge that the neighbor had been accused of harassing Lawrence for quite some time.) A Harris County sheriff’s deputy responded to the call and entered Lawrence’s unlocked apartment. There, he found Lawrence and Tyron Garner engaging in consensual sex. Lawrence and Garner were arrested, held in jail overnight, and charged with violating Section 21.06 of the Texas Penal Code, otherwise known as the Texas “Homosexual Conduct” law, which prohibited engaging “in deviant sexual intercourse with another individual of the same sex.”

Lawrence and Garner pleaded no contest, were convicted of the Class C misdemeanor by a Justice of the Peace in Houston, and were fined $250 with an additional $141.25 in court costs. That conviction led to a series of appeals: the Texas Criminal Court (which rejected the defense’s request to dismiss the charges), a three-judge panel of the Texas 14th Court of Appeals (which ruled the law unconstitutional), and the full nine-judge panel of the 14th Court of Appeals (which reversed the three-judge panel). The appeals then reached the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, which serves as Texas’s Supreme Court for criminal cases. That court refused to hear the case, which left the lower court’s decision standing. Lawrence vs. Texas was then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which agreed to hear the case. On June 26, 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court, in a 6-3 ruling, struck down the Texas anti-sodomy law, along with similar laws in twelve other states.

If you know of something that belongs on the Agenda, please send it here. Don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

As always, please consider this your open thread for the day.

The Daily Agenda for Saturday, November 19

TODAY’S AGENDA (OURS):
Transgender Day of Remembrance: Several locations. While tomorrow is officially the day set aside to remember those who have been murdered as a result of transphobia, some TDoR events are taking place today. TDoR began in reaction to the brutal murder of Rita Hester, who was killed on November 28, 1998. Her murder resulted in the creation of the Remembering Our Dead web site and a candlelight vigil in 1999. In the first nine months of 2011, 116 transgender people have been killed around the world, according to Trans Murder Monitoring (TMM). They also say that there have been at least 681 murders in 50 countries since 2008. Observances for the Transgender Day of Rememberance typically consist of the reading of the names of those who have died because of their gender identity, expression, presentation or perception of gender variance. Observances are being held in cities all around the world. Click here to find an observance near you.

TODAY’S AGENDA (THEIRS):
Thanksgiving Family Forum: Des Moines, IA. The anti-gay Family Leader will host a Thanksgiving Family Forum with GOP presidential candidates Sen. Rick Santorum, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Rep. Ron Paul, former House speaker Newt Gingrich, pizza magnate Herman Cain, and Rep. Michele Bachmann “sitting shoulder to shoulder around a ‘Thanksgiving table’.” That hokey piece of stagecraft is the brainchild of organizer Bob Vander Plaats, who has this as a dress code: “the audience attire will be ‘business casual,’ but the candidates were asked ‘to dress like they’re going to Thanksgiving dinner’.” Which means that one of them will be wearing a loud green sweater with a giant white snowflake.

Noticably absent from the banquet is Gov. Mitt Romney, which has Family Leader’s Bob Vander Plaats steamed at the snub. “Mitt Romney has dissed this base in Iowa and this diss will not stay in Iowa,” he told Fox News. “This has national tentacles. … This might prove that he is not smart enough to be president. …I think what will happen is what happened in 2008. He’s been in this position before. He’s been on top of polls only to find his campaign tanking and sucking air.” Tell us how you really feel, Bob.

Family Leader promises that “ALL the questions will be centered around issues relating to the family and are designed to gauge the constitutional and biblical worldviews of the candidates.” And to make sure none of the candidates move too far from an anti-gay agenda, two ten-minute segments of the two-hour forum will be headed by Focus On the Family’s Tom Minnery, and the National Organization for Marriage’s Brian Brown. The remainder of the one hour and forty minutes will be moderated by Fox News’ Frank Lutz. It begins at 4:00 p.m. at the First Federated Church in Des Moines. While the event is open to the press, the latest word has it that no major network will be televising it. Thank God for small favors.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
American Council of Christian Churches Calls AIDS “God’s Wrath”: 1989. Peter Steinfels wrote in the New York Times about a gathering earlier in November of U.S. Catholic Bishops in Baltimore that had met to hammer out a document responding to the AIDS crisis. The bishops decided overwhelmingly to reject the theological proposition that AIDS was in any way a punishment from God, a position held by one in four Americans, according to a recent poll. J. Gordon Melton, director of the Institute for the Study of American Religion in Santa Barbara, had published 68 statements on AIDS from 45 different religious groups in the United States, Canada and Great Britain, and found “a remarkable” across both liberal and conservative religious groups recognizing that AIDS was not just a gay problem, and “that special ministries should be established to serve AIDS victims, their families and friends, and that the civil rights of homosexuals or of those with the AIDS virus should be protected.” But, The Times learned, that consensus wasn’t unanimous:

The Bible repeatedly describes God as employing all kinds of terrors, natural and human, to punish those who disobey his commands. These biblical accounts naturally governed the reaction of the American Council of Christian Churches, a fundamentalist group that recently expressed dismay at the consensus discovered by Mr. Melton. The council, which claims to represent about two million ”Bible Christians,” promptly went on record upholding the idea that AIDS is God’s wrath visited on homosexuals and drug addicts, although for their ultimate benefit if they turn to Jesus.

If you know of something that belongs on the Agenda, please send it here. Don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

As always, please consider this your open thread for the day.

Federal domestic partnership benefits bill introduced

Cong. Ros-Lehiten with Susan Shelly

About a week ago I had the opportunity to meet Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL). She was in Los Angeles for an evening and made time to speak to Log Cabin Republicans about her ongoing support for civil equality in our nation’s capital, and a friend invited me to be his guest.

At that time she told the assembled crowd that she would be co-sponsoring a bill with Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) to recognize the domestic partners of federal employees and offer benefits equivalent to those offered to spouses. Today that bill was introduced.

“I am pleased to co-sponsor this legislation because we are a nation that prides itself on treating everyone as equals and this bill assures that we bring those same ideals to the regulations that guide federal benefits for domestic partners of federal employees,” said Congresswoman Ros-Lehtinen. “We have taken steps to gain equal rights for all but much remains to be done. Passage of this legislation will be one step in the right direction. I am pleased that the Senate has also introduced a similar bill,” she said.

The companion Senate bill is co-sponsored Senators Susan Collins (R-ME) and Joe Lieberman (I-CT).

(Susan Shelly, pictured with the Congresswoman, is running for Congress as a Republican in the 30th Congressional district as a social liberal and fiscal conservative.)

The Daily Agenda for Friday, November 18

TODAY’S AGENDA:
Transgender Day of Remembrance: Several locations. While Sunday is officially the day set aside to remember those who have been murdered as a result of transphobia, some TDoR events are taking place today and tomorrow. TDoR began in reaction to the brutal murder of Rita Hester, who was killed on November 28, 1998. Her murder resulted in the creation of the Remembering Our Dead web site and a candlelight vigil in 1999. In the first nine months of 2011, 116 transgender people have been killed around the world, according to Trans Murder Monitoring (TMM). They also say that there have been at least 681 murders in 50 countries since 2008. Observances for the Transgender Day of Rememberance typically consist of the reading of the names of those who have died because of their gender identity, expression, presentation or perception of gender variance. Observances are being held in cities all around the world. Click here to find an observance near you.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
Massachusetts Supreme Court Rules In Favor of Marriage Equality: 2003. It’s been eight years since marriage equality arrived in the Bay State, and the sky still hasn’t fallen. It was on this date in 2003 when the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court became the first state supreme court to rule that same-sex couples had a right to marry. In Goodridge v. Department of Public Health, the court ruled 4-3 that the state could not “deny the protections, benefits and obligations conferred by civil marriage to two individuals of the same sex who wish to marry,” and gave the state legislature 180 days to “take any such action as it may deem appropriate” to begin issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Liberty Counsel tried to get the Federal Courts involved, but those efforts failed when the judge denied their request, the First Circuit Court of Appeals backed him up, and the Supreme Court declined to hear the case.  After a long drawn-out battle in which the Massachusetts high court ruled in response to a question from the state Senate that civil unions would not satisfy the court’s ruling. The legislature ended up taking no action, neither blocking nor implementing the Goodridge decision, and the state began marrying same-sex couples on May 17, 2004.

If you know of something that belongs on the Agenda, please send it here. Don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

As always, please consider this your open thread for the day.

Statistics and Pastor Tom

UPDATE BELOW – IT’S EVEN BETTER THAN I COULD WISH FOR

Here’s a statistic you didn’t know:

Pastor Tom Vineyard of Windsor Hill Baptist Church in Oklahoma City consumes in excess of 423 pies a day, meaning that 52% of all pies baked in Oklahoma City are eaten by Vineyard.

A New York judge told me so.

Actually, I have no idea whether Vineyard even likes pie (though I can guess). All of the above statistics are bogus numbers I made up on the spot.

However, I’m willing to bet that they are more accurate than the bogus numbers that Vineyard made up when he went to speak before the Oklahoma City Council in opposition to an ordinance to ban anti-gay discrimination in employment.

Pastor Tom Vineyard of Windsor Hills Baptist Church cited a New York judge in saying more than half of murders in large cities are committed by gay people.

Well, Vineyard didn’t exactly cite the “New York judge” (mental accent courtesy of Pace Picante Sauce), he just claims him as a source. And, in fact, he can’t recall exactly which New York judge actually told him this fascinating statistic (I guess he knows a lot of them). So far, though, no New York judge has stepped forward to claim authorship.

Oh, but pastor Vineyard didn’t stop there. He also informed the council:

“Many homosexuals openly admit that they are pedophiles because they cannot actually reproduce. They resort to recruiting children. … Folks, you’re making a decision that will bring down God’s judgment on your city if you vote in favor of this.”

Ya see, recruiting is a higher priority than actual attraction. So that’s why gays are pedophiles. To keep the numbers up. Because if homosexuals weren’t all barren, then Jerry Sandusky wouldn’t diddle the kiddies. Logical, huh? Where’s my pie?

Now while such obvious nonsense and blatant stupidity would result in hysterical laughter if stated in a group of, oh say, New York judges, the good people of Oklahoma City who showed up to defend anti-gay discrimination in their city seemed to find nothing peculiar about Vineyard’s creative “statistics”.

Vineyard received the longest standing ovation of the day after his remarks.

Because sometimes, when all you know about someone is that you don’t like them, you’ll believe anything you hear. Jews kill Christian babies – and praise God that’s just awful. And The Blacks are all on welfare; isn’t it so sad? And did you hear that the Nazis were all homosexual? Oh yes, and many openly admit it!!

Fortunately not everyone is quite so inclined to believe anything negative about gay people – no matter how truly stupid – that they think they once heard from a New York judge. Scott Hamilton, pastor of Church of the Open Arms in Oklahoma City and executive director of Cimarron Alliance, provided a little faith-based context:

“To couch in Christian terms these so-called statistics, I’ll call them what they are. They are lies.”

Well, I’m sure Pastor Tom is embarrassed now that the town is laughing at him. And they are. But I very much doubt that he’s learned any lesson. Folks like Pastor Tom move right on from whatever bizarre heap of churchpoop he’s shoveling out to “well God says”. It doesn’t matter much to the Pastor Toms if what they said is actually true, because praisegodjesusisthewaythetruthandthelife so Pastor Tom doesn’t have to bother himself with facts. Or with even trying to avoid downright lies.

And one last statistic. Pastor Tom Vineyard of Windsor Hill Baptist Church in Oklahoma City is more than 50% a self-satisfied, blow-hard, arrogant, self-righteous idiot. And I don’t even need a New York judge to tell me so.

UPDATE

A new statistic: Pastor Tom Vineyard is 12% more of a raging loon that previously believed.

Here is Pastor Tom in his own words (but with no pie in sight)

[A little side note about Pastor Tom’s comments about Jesus. You can read them in Luke 17. There isn’t even a sideways hint that maybe possibly Sodom was destroyed cuz of Teh Ghey. In fact, as recorded in that passage Jesus was suggesting that it was indistinguishable from any other day at any other place: “People were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building.” And while there were Sodomites as far as the eye could see, they don’t seem to have been of the homoSEXual variety.]

Ya know, Pastor Tom sounds authoritative, doesn’t he. Just one problem… Pastor Tom is more full of CP (churchpoop) than he is of pie. David Badash of the New Civil Rights Movement compiles some work from Stephanie Zvan with Pastor Tom’s letter and calls CP on all of the mess.

Why the California State Supreme Court’s Decision Is A Good Thing

Of course in my heart I wanted today’s ruling by the California Supreme Court to go differently than it did. But in my head I had little doubt about the outcome. In ruling that Prop 8 proponents have legal standing to defend their handiwork in court, the court established a precedent that upholds the spirit of California’s system of initiative and referendum. It also, if taken to what I believe should be its logical conclusion, can become a starting point for reforming some of the worst abuses of California’s initiative process by holding proposition supporters accountable for the propositions they’ve foisted on the state.

California’s initiative and referendum was initially implemented as part of a broader political reform movement intended to give citizens the ability to make the laws that their elected officials refused to do. In theory, that sounds like a very good idea, I think most of us can agree that its practice in California has been a disaster. The patchwork of accreted propositions over the decades have made the state effectively ungovernable, while the initiative process itself has been hijacked by powerful special interest groups who pump multiple millions of dollars into the campaigns to get their favorite measures approved. Prop 8 alone came with a price tag of more than $83 million. With that kind of money, the citizen-legislator that the initiative and referendum system was supposed to empower hardly matters any more. The obscene sums spent on various propositions by powerful interest groups makes the whole idea of harnessing the collective wisdom of citizen-legislators, well, sad. Look at what all that money got us: a discriminatory law written into California’s Constitution in a process that leveraged prejudices and fear to win votes.

It’s no wonder then that when Americans For Equal Rights sued to overturn Prop 8 on constitutional grounds, the state stepped aside and said they wouldn’t defend it. And why should they? Prop 8 wasn’t Sacramento’s doing. It was the product of anti-gay activists who put the proposition on the ballot and spent millions on a campaign pitting Californians against fellow Californians. Why should the state defend Prop 8 supporter’s pet cause?

In fact, why should the state defend anything they didn’t enact in the first place? And furthermore, in the spirit of citizen initiative and referendum, why would anyone want the state to defend something they had no hand in creating — whether it’s Prop 8 or any other proposition that had passed without the state’s support? The California court examined those questions and observed, “Because of their special relationship to the initiative measure, the official proponents of the measure are the most obvious and logical private individuals to ably and vigorously defend the validity of the challenged measure…” 

I think they’re on to something, and the Prop 8 case is a great example. When the state stepped aside and said they wouldn’t defend Prop 8, Federal District Judge Vaughn Walker let Prop 8’s supporters defend the law in his court. And look what we got: a mess so embarrassing that the defendants themselves have been fighting hard to keep the trial’s videotapes out of public view. Prop 8 supporters won their electoral campaign by playing on the worse prejudices against LGBT people, only to have to try to deny in court that prejudice played any role in the campaign. That didn’t work. They tried to claim that social science argued against same-sex marriage. That effort completely fell apart. After Prop 8 was ruled unconstitutional, Prop 8 supporters tried to claim that because Judge Walker was gay, his ruling should be overturned. That didn’t work either.

If you ask me, holding Prop 8 supporters accountable for their proposition has been nothing but a big plus for our side. Remember, these are the guys who are “the most obvious and logical private individuals to ably and vigorously defend” Prop 8. Don’t you just love it?

So if I had a complaint against the California State Supreme Court ruling, it would be that it doesn’t go far enough. I think state officials should be prohibited from defending any proposition placed on the ballot via citizen initiative. That burden should be borne by those who campaigned for the proposition’s passage. If they think it’s just a great idea during the campaign, they also ought to be able to explain why it’s a great law in court. And if they can amass the millions of dollars it took to win passage of their pet proposition, then they can stick around after the election to defend the law — and to raise the money for the legal bills — if it lands in court.

This could open the door to some substantive reform in California’s initiative and referendum process. If a campaign knew that they may be called upon to defend their handiwork in court, maybe they’d think twice about their efforts. Maybe they would more carefully consider the ramifications of their proposals before election day if they knew they’d have to defend them after election day. Maybe they would think twice about exploiting irrational fears and prejudices against a minority if they knew they’d have to explain how their law wasn’t irrationally fear-based and prejudiced in court. And yes, maybe monkeys might fly out of my butt. But holding people accountable for their actions has never been a bad thing. It has worked pretty well so far with Prop 8.

CA Supremes get it wrong on representing the state

The California Supreme Court has weighed in with their opinion as to who can appeal a federal decision in which the State itself is the defendant. Should elected officials which represent the state decide to accept the decision of the federal court rather than appeal, individuals or groups who disagree with the decision of the elected representatives can themselves assume the mantle of “the state” and act as though the electorate had chosen them instead.

In response to the question submitted by the Ninth Circuit, we conclude, for the reasons discussed above, that when the public officials who ordinarily defend a challenged state law or appeal a judgment invalidating the law decline to do so, under article II, section 8 of the California Constitution and the relevant provisions of the Elections Code, the official proponents of a voter-approved initiative measure are authorized to assert the state’s interest in the initiative’s validity, enabling the proponents to defend the constitutionality of the initiative and to appeal a judgment invalidating the initiative.

This is, I believe, an ill conceived decision, and not only because of its impact on Perry v. Schwarzenegger.

In California, initiatives serve a peculiar function. Decades of legislator-crafted districting and closed-structure power building have left the legislature in the control of a small handful of people. It is not infrequent that a large majority of the people of the state have a strong position that is in opposition to that which the oligarchy takes. So, from time to time the electorate will pass some initiative that is intended to serve as a “wake-up” to Sacramento. (1978’s Proposition 13, which limited the extent to which the state could increase spiraling property taxes, is an example.)

But Californians also have an erratic or whimsical approach to initiatives at times. And then we end up with the people placing a ban on eating horse meat.

But whether serious or wacky, initiatives are at times hastily or ignorantly drafted and – if applied literally – could be disastrous to the functioning of the state. So courts step in and toss out extreme provisions and, assuming that the end result addresses the concerns of the voters, the matter is concluded.

But that assumes that responsible parties can weigh the value of appeal, the importance of language, the constitutionality of various proposals and the way in which an initiative impacts other areas of law. And it also assumes that the State, in its official capacity, will conduct itself with honor and present its case based on the constitutions of the nation and the state, legal precedent, honest testimony, and cogent argument. For these purposes, the State of California elects an Attorney General.

But this decision opens the door for extremist wackos – of all political bents – to throw the state into chaos. If a Governor and Attorney General are not entitled to determine which provisions are worth fighting for and which can be conceded, and if we turn that decision over to idealists who believe that every word in their manifesto is of extreme importance, then my state is slated for some very confusing times.

The California Supreme Court, I believe, got caught up in the emotion of Proposition 8 and “the will of the people” and did not carefully consider the bigger question of representation.