DISQUS

gwpriester · 1 year ago

I am so sick and tired of these sanctimonious busy bodies trying to run other people's lives. Maybe it's time to have a ballot initiative that bans the religious right.

munjoyfan · 1 year ago

wait a minute. This guy wants to be president. We have a right to know just what his disability is. Clearly he was found, and continues to be found, by government doctors to be unfit for some types of work. Just what types of work is he unable to perform? and what is the disabling condition?

ucsbclassics53 · 1 year ago

Texas' Proposition 2 was so badly written too, remember?

(a) Marriage in this state shall consist only of the union of one man and one woman.
(b) This state or a political subdivision of this state may not create or recognize any legal status identical or similar to marriage.(

Bush_Bites · 1 year ago

Cool.

(sorry, couldn't resist.)

Bush_Bites · 1 year ago

Um, well the "ban all marriage" stuff was cool.

Not the domestic violence stuff, obviously.

Oh, nevermind....

FNReedie · 1 year ago

I actually think this is a very real scenario. The CA Supreme Court ruling did not claim create gay marriage ... instead it said that gays and lesbians can not be held to a different standard. This is the major difference. Even if the initiative passes, it is highly unlikely to be found Constitutional. Don't get me wrong, this will be a major fight -- and will be much better for us if we defeat the initiative. Have you donated to the fight yet? If not, go to http://tinyurl.com/3vubh8

Steve_in_CNJ · 1 year ago

a constitutional amendment is constitutional by DEFINITION. that's why these initiatives are so insidious.

FNReedie · 1 year ago

Um ... no. Not if the amendment contradicts other rulings. All it will do is cause legal chaos until the courts rule again. Go read the last ruling and you can see that it was clearly written with this amendment in mind. If the original ruling would have been specific to gay marriage, it probably would fail -- but that is not the case, nor is it the heart of the ruling.

Steve_in_CNJ · 1 year ago

not sure what you mean. if supreme courts could "overturn" constitutional amendments, there would be challenges in all of the 30 or so states where it has happened. the majority decision in this case is 121 pages long. perhaps you can point me to the part that says the court is poised to overturn the next constitutional amendment. also point me to the part that says the decision is not specific to gay marriage.

jr · 1 year ago

people that believe the Earth is 6,000 years old shouldn't be able to introduce ballot initiatives

OlderAndWiser · 1 year ago

No religious entity or their followers should be able to put an initiative like this up for a popular vote. Seems this would violate the separate of church and state. Even religious ceremonies require a "marriage license" issued by the State. The State can issue those licenses to whomever the law says they can. Looks like the court has already spoken on same sex marriage in CA. I think the point of the "religious right" is moot.

Indigo · 1 year ago

Has Colbert rehashed this issue yet?

AnalyticalLiberal · 1 year ago

Tell them about Michigan, too. Proposal 2, two years ago, was advertised to ban same sex marriage and domestic benefits for same-sex partners employed in government or public education. Its promoters knew better because of how broadly written was the "approved" ballot language; they used fraud to collect signatures; and the Rethugs in charge of the Department of Attorney General convinced the public that the change was limited to gays only. Result? The Rethug controlled Supreme Court has ruled that local governmental units and universities cannot provide ANY benefits for ANY domestic partner (hetero or gay) - ONLY for members of the same "family" - i.e., "one man married to one woman and their legally created children." How's that for overly broad??

Bostonian_Queer_in_Dallas · 1 year ago

It is time for the US to go the European route. Your legal marriage takes place at the Registry office or town hall. That is the document for taxes, etc. The church, synagogue, or mosque? Fine if you wanna let some mythbeast watch you kiss your spouse. But it has NO WEIGHT whatsoever. The clergyman or person of that ceremony can make out some fancy document for god, but the town hall is what mattered.

Andrew A. Gill · 1 year ago

What Bostonian_Queer_in_Dallas says is right.

If you want to have your religion provide the litmus test for who can or cannot get married, that's fine, so long as that marriage is not seen as valid outside of your religious group.

Keep the legal marriage a separate concept from a religious marriage.

yeahsure · 1 year ago

FNReedie is quite correct in my opinion. The California Supreme Court did NOT redefine marriage or approve "gay marriage." What it did was state that gay people as a suspect class must be treated equally under the law in accordance with the equal protection clause. What the Court decided is that ALL citizens in California require equal protection under the law wich includes the class of people who are gay. Further, it stated that any statute that tends to restrict a groups liberty or equality under the law needs to meet a high standard of review i.e. strict scrutiny AND must fulfill a compelling state interest to be allowed under the California Constitution. I think that the Court anticipated a constitutional amendment and ruled this way to provide grounds to declare the amendment itself unconstitutional on the grounds that it violates the equal protection clause by eliminationg an equal-right that already exists. Also it is my understanding that the Court may consider this constitutional "amendment" to instead be a constitutional revision which is subject to a much greater standard of review than an amemdment.

ndtovent · 1 year ago

Damn, i wish I'd seen this thread earlier. There was a good article in today's WaPo about this. Here is the link:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/ar...

I got a real kick out of this paragraph:
"The sense of confusion was heightened last week when the clerk of Kern County announced that she would stop performing all marriages -- gay and heterosexual -- on June 13, three days before the court decision goes into effect. The clerk said among her reasons were lack of space, staff, money and security. "

HAHAHAHAHA! She won't even issues het marriage licenses! HAHAHA! that made my day... Sometimes it's the little things.

Antigone · 1 year ago

This just proves what I've said all along. The Christian Reich doesn't just hate them some gays. They hate women too, and they can't stand the thought of either of us having sex - the GBLT community having sex at all, and women having sex outside of marriage. So all these bullshit laws are designed to punish gays and punish women who are "living in sin." They need to mind their own bloody business and stay out of other peoples lives and bedrooms.