In 2008, the California Supreme Court ruled that banning gay marriage in the Golden State was unconstitutional. The basis of this ruling was simple: the act of banning marriage for gays amounted to creating a status of second class citizens. Gay activists applauded the ruling, while conservatives derided it as an assault on traditional values. Soon after the ruling over 18,000 gay Californians tied the knot, committing to their relationship with one another just as straight Americans would.
The victory for gay Californians was short lived. Voters approved Proposition 8 during the fall 2008 election, banning gay marriage once again as an amendment to their state constitution. While the margin was close, only 52 percent of Californians voted in favor of Prop 8, compared to over 60 percent just eight years earlier, it made little difference to those that were once again unable to achieve marriage equality.
The battle continued beyond Election Day. While by 2009 gay marriage was legalized in Connecticut, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont, Californians found themselves going backwards in the equality movement. A court challenge with the California Supreme Court was filed shortly after Prop 8 became law. The argument of the pro-marriage community was that Prop 8 first needed approval from the legislature before it could be approved by voters, since it fundamentally changed a basic right of citizens.
The California Supreme Court sided with supporters of Prop 8. As Lisa Leff of the Huffington Post put it, “While gay rights advocates accused the court of failing to protect a minority group from the will of the majority, the justices said that the state’s governing framework gives voters almost unfettered ability to change the California Constitution.” However, the ruling left unchanged the 18,000 gay marriages that had taken place between the initial Supreme Court ruling and Election Day of 2008.
The Prop 8 fight was seemingly over. Gay rights activists debated amongst each other whether a push to overturn Prop 8 should be put on the ballot in 2010 or 2012. Some argued that the quicker, the better, while tempers were still flared and gay rights activists were ready to go. Others argued that losing again in 2010 would set back the gay rights agenda more than Prop 8 did. Instead, waiting until 2012 would be the preferable approach, allowing a carefully crafted campaign to be built.
While Californians bickered amongst themselves about a way forward, two powerful Washington D.C. attorneys were setting their sights on the Golden State. Former Bush Solicitor General Ted Olson, a conservative by any standard, joined forces with Democrat David Boies to challenge Proposition 8 in federal court. The two formerly faced off in the U.S. Supreme Court case Bush v. Gore, which ultimately decided the 2000 presidential election.
These unlikely allies filed their lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Northern California on behalf of two gay men and two gay women. “Our Constitution guarantees every American the right to be treated equally under the law,” Boies said in May 2009. “There is no right more fundamental than the right to marry the person that you love and to raise a family… The courts exist to reverse injustices… This is not a question of state law. It’s a question of federal Constitutional law.”
The case before the U.S. District Court, which is in its final stages, wrested on the history of discrimination against gays in the United States and the equal protection clause of the Constitution. Both Boies and Olson argue that Proposition 8 violates basic constitutional protections. “This case is about the equal rights guaranteed to every American under the United States Constitution,” Olson said.
As Boies and Olson have pointed out, Prop 8 and the California Supreme Court ruling that followed created three distinct classes of Californians: straights that were free to marry (and divorce) whenever they want; the 18,000 gays that were married between their initial ruling and Prop 8 passing who were allowed to keep their marriages; and every other gay Californian who were not entitled to any marriage rights at all. Any reasonable interpretation of this ruling is that it violates basic constitutional principles of equal justice.
The hope of these attorneys is to eventually see the U.S. Supreme Court hear their case. This is, of course, more than just about California. It is about the legal rights of all Americans. I personally find it ironic that the act of banning gay marriage in Proposition 8 could ultimately lead to the opposite – legalization across the nation. A favorable ruling from the Supreme Court would mean that gays and lesbians could marry in every state. Such a reality depends on the verdict of one judge in California and the U.S. Supreme Court to protect the rights of this nation’s citizens.
The sign on the door of the GOP is simple: “Moderates Need Not Apply”. The latest moderate GOP politician, if you can call him that, is Delaware’s lone Congressman Mike Castle. He is running for the Senate seat formerly held by Joe Biden before he became Vice President. Biden’s son Beau decided against running for his father’s former seat, leaving Castle as the favorite.
The Tea Partiers won’t have any of that, though. They strive for ideological purity over pragmatic political choices. You would think that they would have learned from last fall’s New York 23rd District that running teabaggers is not a way to win elections in swing districts. Democrat Bill Owens won that race, despite the fact that it had been Republican since the Civil War.
Instead, a right-wing challenger is exactly what Mike Castle is going to get. As reported by the Wilmington News Journal, Christine O’Donnell will challenge Rep. Mike Castle (R) in Delaware’s GOP Senate primary. She is a political commentator and a former (unsuccessful) two time candidate for Senate in 2006 and 2008. I can guarantee that O’Donnell will give Castle a run for his money if she fully embraces the Tea Party movement.
You may recall Congressman Castle from a town hall meeting last summer where a member of the audience brought in her birth certificate and demanded to know “why are you people ignoring his birth certificate?” Of course, she is referring to President Obama. The crowd burst into applause. “He is NOT an American citizen. He is a citizen of Kenya.” When Congressman Castle corrected her, the crowd booed him.
These people are the base of the Republican Party today. Moderates like Mike Castle, who will at least publicly say that the President is a U.S. citizen, are not popular with the Tea Party crowd. It’s odd how you are now a moderate if you can recognize facts from lunatic fringe conspiracy theories, but that’s the reality that we are living in.
Castle is not the only Republican facing a serious challenge from conservative challengers. Senator Arlen Specter was challenged from the right in Pennsylvania and left the Republican Party last year because polling showed that he would lose to conservative Pat Toomey. He was just the first casualty of this war against moderates. Governor Charlie Crist of Florida, once the favorite to win the Republican nomination for Senate in Florida, is now trailing conservative challenger Marco Rubio by nearly 20 percent. Not even the nominee of the Republican Party in 2008 is immune to these primary challenges. John McCain is facing off against former Congressman J.D. Hayworth.
For Democrats, the self-implosion of the Republican Party from right-wing extremists is a welcome development going into the 2010 elections. Democrats can position their candidates against the same tired conservative politicians that ran the country into the ground under George W. Bush. Unfortunately, it also means that there will be even fewer potential allies for President Obama and Congressional Democrats to turn to in order to pass legislation.
It is Read an E-Book Week from March 7 to 13. To celebrate this year’s promotion of e-reading, I will be offering all of my e-books for 50% off of their original price. Enter the code RAE50 at checkout to redeem your discount. On top of that, people that tweet about this article (linking to it) will be eligible to win a FREE copy of one of my e-books. Be sure to include @kylewbell in your tweet. Of course you can sample each of my books before you buy them. Just click the links below for each book:
They come in many different formats for different devices. Everything from the Sony Reader to the Amazon Kindle are supported. The winner of the free e-book will be selected randomly after the conclusion of Read an E-Book Week. Follow @kylewbell for updates on future promotions and news.
Governor Rick Perry of Texas has defeated Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison in the race for the GOP nomination for governor. Perry, the longest serving governor in Texas history, became governor when George W. Bush resigned to become president in 2001. His bid for a third full term was thought to be in real jeopardy when Hutchison announced her intention to run. In 2006, he was re-elected with less than 40 percent of the vote.
You may recall Rick Perry as the guy that mentioned secession as a possibility for Texas because of the policies of Barack Obama. “We’ve got a great union. There’s absolutely no reason to dissolve it. But if Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, you know, who knows what might come out of that. But Texas is a very unique place, and we’re a pretty independent lot to boot,” he said in 2009.
Ultimately, the conservative voters of Texas won out. Perry garnered 51 percent of the vote, compared to 31 percent for Hutchison. A third Republican candidate, Debra Medina, has 18 percent of the vote. Medina raised the possibility that 9/11 was an inside job during an interview with Glenn Beck. Clearly it didn’t hurt her too much in the Republican Party as she was a no-name candidate, yet managed to register in double digits.
“I don’t have all of the evidence there, Glenn, so I don’t, I’m not in a place, I have not been out publicly questioning that. I think some very good questions have been raised in that regard. There are some very good arguments, and I think the American people have not seen all of the evidence there so I have not taken a position on that,” Medina said.
Democrats see this as their best opportunity to win the Texas governorship in over a decade. The popular Houston Mayor Bill White will be the Democratic Party’s nominee. Having won 76 percent of the vote, the Democrats are clearly united behind their candidate. It will take some repairing for Perry to win over Hutchison voters, particularly given the nastiness of the campaign. We’ll see in November.
Almost all of the attention as of late has been on the Senate, but the House of Representatives could prove decisive in the battle to reform America’s ailing health care system. Both chambers have already passed separate versions of the bill with the Senate voting 60-40 and the House 220-215. The House passed their version of the bill in November with the Senate voting on Christmas Eve. The President’s health care summit does not appear to have changed the math.
Percentage wise, the vote was a lot closer in the House than it was in the Senate. The reason that the Senate got all of our attention was because of the Republican’s obstruction tactics, namely the filibuster, which requires 3/5 for passage instead of a majority vote. The President and Democratic leaders in the Senate appear to be ready to break the Republican’s filibuster attempts by passing a “fixed” version of the bill using a procedural device known as reconciliation.
It’s worth noting that Republicans attacking Democrats for using procedural shortcuts are themselves using procedural roadblocks. The filibuster is not in the Constitution and it is not even a law. It is simply a rule within the Senate which can be revised at the start of each Congress. Reconciliation, however, is in fact a law that was passed in the 1970s to reconcile budget issues. This is exactly what Democrats are likely to use it for as they will make changes to their original bill such as how to pay for it.
Going back to the House, though, it is unlikely that Speaker Pelosi currently has the votes to pass the Senate bill. There are two major hurdles that Democrats will need to face before President Obama can finally sign the bill. The first is that Democrats have literally lost three of their members from resignations and a death. Representative Jack Murtha recently passed away, Rep. Neil Abercrombie resigned to focus on his bid for governor of Hawaii and Robert Wexler resigned to head the Center for Middle East Peace and Economic Cooperation. In other words, with these vacancies, the Democrats stand at 217-215, not enough to pass the bill. A majority of the chamber is 218. The sole Republican to vote with Democrats, Joseph Cao, has stated that he will likely vote against it the second time. That puts Democrats two votes short of a majority.
Is it possible for Nancy Pelosi to strong-arm Democrats that voted against the bill to vote for this revised bill? Certainly it is possible, she could threaten everything from fundraising to committee spots, but most of the Democrats that voted no are conservatives from mostly rural and/or Southern districts. She could make the argument that even Democrats that voted against the health care bill are in big trouble – perhaps because they are undercutting their base. In New Mexico, Harry Teague is trailing former Congressman Pearce by two points, even though he voted against the original bill. Would he be in a stronger position if he had voted to extend insurance benefits to the 45 million that currently live without it? Probably, especially in a relatively poor state like New Mexico.
The second problem for Democrats in the House is the issue of abortion. Bart Stupak of Michigan was successful in passing an amendment that would ban any insurance policies from covering an elective abortion in the bill’s insurance exchange, which would include policy choices from both private and public insurance plans. Democrats in the Senate sought to continue the ban on any public funds going towards abortion, but did not want to restrict private insurance plans in the exchange from offering it. It’s questionable whether pro-life Democrats will vote for the House bill if the Stupak amendment is not present and it’s equally questionable whether pro-choice Democrats will vote for a bill that includes it.
*Edit*
According to CNN, due to the vacancies, the majority in the House is now 217.
As an author, you want to reach as large of an audience as possible. That’s why I’ve been working to get my e-books sold on more than just Amazon.com and Smashwords. After a relatively long wait, all four of my works are now available for purchase on Barnes & Noble’s website. They have also been cataloged by Google Books. In the coming weeks my books will become available on Sony and Kobo. Hopefully others will join in the future. Below are links to the B&N pages:
I am not one to believe in the suppression of ideas. Political correctness in the United States has often run amok to the point that we can not even have honest and open conversations with each other anymore. The “word police” are not something that I embrace.
Yet I am troubled by what I find in today’s world, particularly among this nation’s youth. Words like “nigger”, “faggot”, “bitch” and “gay” are thrown around with such regularity (and derogatory meaning) that their use is hardly shocking anymore. We have become desensitized to true racism, sexism and homophobia as normal expressions.
I think that most people would agree that the use of these words by public officials would be considered wrong. Most white people are cognizant enough of the social reality of today’s world and increasing diversity of our nation to not use “nigger” or “faggot” in a public place. Among their friends and family, though, it’s fair game.
It’s sad for me to see otherwise intelligent and respectable people go down the road of racial epithets and demeaning terminology. Of course, for a class of citizens that consist of a majority (like straight white males), it is hard to understand how language can reduce their fellow citizens to a status of second class. Instead, it takes a certain sensitivity to a world that they do not fully understand. Putting yourself in someone’s shoes is perhaps one of the most difficult tasks for a human being to do.
My own friends and family are guilty of these very acts. “Gay” is used interchangeably with something that is bad or undesirable. The same goes for “faggot”. I never used to be offended by these words, but the more that I hear them, the more that I feel like the people that surround me are not respecting who I am. It would be unconscionable these days to call a black person a “nigger”, yet apparently the same does not apply for gay people.
I think that the use of any of these words is unacceptable. We should be mindful of each other and respectful of the differences between us. Perhaps it would lead to more trust, less conflict and a better world. That said, not much separates gay Americans from straight Americans other than a difference in attraction. The same can be said for blacks and whites. We simply have different colored skin. Allowing labels and stereotypes to define who we are as a people is against the very idea of being an American: unique, independent and tolerant.
The Obama administration has been building up its contention that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, also known as the stimulus, saved the economy from economic depression. The numbers lay this out clearly. During the last months of the Bush administration, the economy was shedding 800,000 jobs a month. After the stimulus passed and began funding projects, cutting taxes for 95% of families and saving everything from teacher’s jobs to police officer’s, the unemployment numbers began to decline.
While the rate of unemployment continued to increase, this slowed dramatically until in November 2009, when the economy finally began to create jobs again. As the president has said continuously, we have a long way to go before everyone that wants a job can find one. But to deny that the stimulus is working is to deny reality. Congress should follow up by passing a new jobs bill to spur further employment opportunities for our citizens. Republicans that block a jobs bill should be punished by voters for playing politics with the health of our economy.
The Mayor of South Bend, Indiana today announced that the city would apply for federal grants that would make it possible for a streetcar system to link downtown with the University of Notre Dame, residential and commercial areas of the city. As the South Bend Tribune reports:
Transpo, the local bus service, is seeking federal grants to develop a fixed-rail streetcar route that would connect the two tech parks and link the university with downtown, he said.
The project would use state-of-the-art, fuel-efficient gas/electric hybrid streetcars, a growing trend in some larger U.S. cities. Technological advances in the hybrid cars would negate the need for unsightly overhead electrical wires, he said.
“As we start to see companies migrate from Innovation Park to Ignition Park, it would make it easier to connect the two,” Luecke said afterward. “People could live in Eddy Street Commons, work at Ignition Park and not have to have a car.”
This project would be similar to what other cities have tried, particularly on the West Coast, to provide affordable, clean public transportation options that link central business districts to technology parks and universities. Portland, Oregon is a good example of a modern streetcar system. If the city can win federal support for the project, it could come with minimal start-up costs for the city of South Bend. While some local residents may not find this to be all that appealing, trying to attract new high income residents means that we need to upgrade our public transportation system.
Mayor Luecke also announced in his State of the City address that South Bend would compete for Google’s plan to provide ultra high speed Internet to a trial city. Using fiber optic cables, which South Bend already has developed for businesses and universities, Google would provide Internet speeds of up to 1GB per second at “competitive prices.” South Bend plans on submitting its application by the March 26 deadline.
The past couple weeks we have been tracking the Indiana Senate race as former senator Dan Coats announced his plans to challenge incumbent Senator Evan Bayh. Polling showed that Bayh was far ahead 55-35% and would cruise to re-election. Yet just a day before the filing deadline, Bayh announced that he would not be seeking re-election. Given his 61% approval rating in Indiana, this is one of those rare retirement announcements that was not politically motivated so much as it was a personal decision.
“Congress is not operating as it should,” Bayh said at a news conference in Indianapolis. “The people’s business is not getting done.” He blamed this on increased partisanship and strident ideology in Congress. “I do not love Congress,” Bayh said. “I’m an executive at heart. I value my independence.”
Bayh cited two recent examples of issues that should have garnered bipartisan support, yet were defeated due to political reasons. The first was a deficit reduction commission that Republicans said they supported, but at the last minute 7 of them pulled out even though they co-sponsored the bill. The second was a jobs bill that failed to pass despite the still high unemployment rate.
While a lot of outsiders are going to say that Bayh retired due to an increasingly anti-incumbent mood in the country, the facts do not bear this out. Not only does he continue to be enormously popular in Indiana, he led both of his potential opponents by substantial margins (not to mention both of them are flawed candidates). Finally, Bayh had $12 million in his campaign warchest to spend as he pleased. That’s a ton of money in a medium-sized state like Indiana. He could have saturated the airwaves with ads from July until Election Day and still had money to spare. I take him for his word that his motivation was due to gridlock. Ultimately, if Bayh wants to return to Indianapolis to serve as governor, he has that opportunity now in 2012.
Senator Bayh has taken a lot of heat from liberal bloggers across the country for his centrist positions. As a resident of this state, I have to say that some of his positions (particularly on climate change) were disappointing, yet reflect a realization that Indiana stood not to benefit from cap-and-trade, but to potentially face increased energy costs. He was doing his job to stand for the interests of his state just as California’s delegation was pleading for financial assistance as their state was drowning in debt. From some of the postings that I have read on other sites, you would think that Bayh was a total pariah. In reality he voted for the stimulus and for health care reform, either of which he could have stopped had he sided with the Republicans in their opposition. It was Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Joe Lieberman of Connecticut and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana that required special treatment in order to win their votes. Bayh was a team player.
As for who will replace Bayh as the Democratic candidate for Senate, the state party will probably decide that, since the filing deadline is tomorrow. Any of Indiana’s Democratic House members would be a good pick, including Congressman Joe Donnelly representing my district (Indiana’s 2nd). The favorites seem to be either Representative Baron Hill or Brad Ellsworth. Both of them come from mostly rural, Southern Indiana districts where Democrats will need to win in order to win statewide. Ironically, if Ellsworth gets the nod, he may face former Republican Rep. John Hostetler whom he beat in 2006. It should be an interesting Senate race in Indiana this year.
In 2008, the California Supreme Court ruled that banning gay marriage in the Golden State was unconstitutional. The basis of this ruling was simple: the act of banning marriage for gays amounted to creating a status of second class citizens. Gay activists applauded the ruling, while conservatives derided it as an assault on traditional values. Soon after the ruling over 18,000 gay Californians tied the knot, committing to their relationship with one another just as straight Americans would.
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