Tea Parties: Where the Energy is on the Right
With 4,000 tea party patriots rallying against big government and higher taxation in St. Louis yesterday, it’s becoming increasingly clear that this phenomenon is here to stay.
This is not some flash in the pan movement. Americans have been protesting the Administration’s spendthrift policies at least since February. And the roots of this movement may even go back to the fall of 2007 when people started flocking to the libertarian Ron Paul’s quixotic campaign for the GOP presidential nomination.
Tea party protests certainly belong on any list of the top 10, if not top 5, phenomena of 2009. If Time magazine took conservative ideas seriously, they would consider these protestors as candidates for People of the Year.
As a gay conservative, it’s reassuring to see the rise of these protests. It shows that the energy on the right is not among the social conservatives seeking to stymie the growing acceptance of gay people in America today. Instead, the energy is among those of us who seek to reduce the size of government, thus increasing individual freedom.
Watching the increasing number of Americans rallying to the cause of freedom reminds me of the relief I felt back in 1994 when I first read the Contract with America. After it appeared to some that Republicans were moving in the direction of social conservatism in 1992, the Contract showed the GOP returning to its small government principles. We’re seeing the same thing today.
And as Republican officials and candidates recognize the resilience of the Reaganite ideas embodied in these protests, seeing them as a legitimate expression of the sentiment of a growing number of Americans (confirmed by a recent Gallup poll), they’re beginning to realize to win back to congressional majorities, they need focus on cutting government spending and reducing federal regulation. And oppose the Obama Democrats’ big government solutions to our nation’s problems.
So, don’t be deceived about the direction of American conservatism in the post-George W. Bush era. You can see it on the streets of cities across the nation. And read it in the polls. The tea parties may not yet have succeeded in returning America to its small government ideas, but they have galvanized a large segment of the American people. And showed that the principles Ronald Reagan so eloquently articulated still resonate far and wide across the fruited plain.
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I don’t remember seeing any anti-gay signs in any footage of tea parties I have seen. Again, some anti-gay sentiment is usually hinted at by the Keith-and-Rachel gang, but probably is not there.
I’m not intimidated by people wearing guns (I own several myself). And I’m beginning to see the heavy hand of manipulation in all the “be very afraid and constantly pissed off” rhetoric coming from the Left. It’s getting clumsier all the time.
Hmmm….no delivery on ANYTHING promised by the Obama Administration, coupled with the usual “quit bitching, take a number and wait at the end of the line” admonitions from all those straight liberals who CARE so much about us. Could this be the return of an old and familiar trend?
Comment by Lori Heine — November 29, 2009 @ 3:12 pm - November 29, 2009
I’m a social and fiscal conservative. Like you, B. Daniel, I’m heartened by the growing strength of the Tea Party movement; where I part ways with you is over your contempt for social conservatives (socons). I don’t see any contradiction between advocating smaller government AND traditional values.
I don’t see the mainstreaming of homosexuality as a great leap forward for civilization. I see it as signaling a total break down of our traditional moral order, a break down that will also lead to the acceptance of all other sexual/domestic lifestyles regarded, for now, as deviant. I’m not reassured by self-serving assurances from gay activists that that won’t happen. How can gay activists assure such a thing, when their whole raison d’etre has been tearing down traditional morality in order to normalize their desires? So, if traditional morality is destroyed, what’s going to stop the polygamists, pedophiles, pederasts, and the bestiality people from demanding their “civil rights”? That’s not a facetious question. It’s a very serious question to which I’ve never gotten an honest answer from gays, even the “conservative” ones. Would you care to give an answer, B. Daniel?
Comment by Seane-Anna — November 29, 2009 @ 3:19 pm - November 29, 2009
Seanne-Anna, I don’t have complete contempt for social conservatives and do believe they raise some legitimate concerns, just don’t want them dominating the conservative movement.
I also don’t want to see traditional morality destroyed, merely want to see it expanded to include acceptance of homosexuality. I have faulted gay marriage advocates numerous times on this blog for not addressing monogamy in their conversations on gay marriage.
You are right, some gay activists do want to destroy traditional morality while others (yours truly included) see it as a framework in which to channel our sexual/emotional desires.
Comment by B. Daniel Blatt — November 29, 2009 @ 4:23 pm - November 29, 2009
Every coalition has this kind of friction. IMHO the Left has it much worse: they count up delegates based on grievances, genitals and a color wheel. Pathetic, really.
Our social and paleo-conservative friends (rightly) point to the culture wars of the 60’s and 70’s and see their position as one of self-defense. Can we take them at their word? Can we imagine a system when busybodies left and right are not accorded the power to tell you who to sleep with, what to eat or what to teach your children? I can. It’s the genius of federalism!
We have the blueprint for success and can actually give the next generation something worthwhile instead of just debt.
Best wishes,
-MFS
Comment by MFS — November 29, 2009 @ 5:04 pm - November 29, 2009
I’d like to 1st address the instances of hand guns being present at any of the Tea Party Rallies this past summer… By all accounts it happened only twice… First by a White American and the 2nd time by an African American… Both individuals had the weapons holstered to their thighs in plain sight and never once drew their weapons… Both men were licensed in their state to carry a weapon and at no time did they violate the law.
I do believe under both state and federal law marriage is defined as a union by only 2 adults of consenting age…… That being said, I would think it impossible for even a moron with an agenda to shape a debate promoting the acceptability of a pig screwer and his Suidae bride to wed. I find it morally bankrupt for anyone to equate the marriage of gay folk to any sexual perverse acts. More oft than not, moronic comments are spewed by pious clergymen or terrified heterosexuals. These individuals need to quit grabbing at straws in order to find a reason homosexuals should not wed. Who is any one to put asunder what God would join together?
Comment by Spartann — November 29, 2009 @ 5:21 pm - November 29, 2009
Regarding the allegations of weapons-packing at tea party events, I’m sure the actual facts have been less dramatic than they were reported to have been. The theme of the reports has usually been “guns, guns, guns! What maniacs these folks must be…let’s panic!”
I agree with Spartann that the slippery-slope hysterics employed by those opposing gay marriage are becoming tired and threadbare. These people never seem to employ them in the consideration of the gains they have gotten from changes in “traditional” morality. The Seane-Annas of this world are always more than happy to grab any privileges they can get, blithely unmindful of the fact that many, many innovations in traditional morality were necessary in order for them to get them.
Slippery-slope arguments imply that at some point we’ve all just got to go stark-raving mad and throw out all morality altogether. They assume we have no choice but to get naked, set our hair on fire and become savages. Those who do this give up completely on the possibility of rational thought, or of drawing the line between the sensible and the stupid. Maybe they can’t do it, but if none of the rest of us could we’d all still be living in caves and painting ourselves blue.
When marriage evolved from being strictly a business arrangement — a man’s purchase of a bride — into a union entered into out of mutual love, people like Seane-Anna set their hair on fire and screamed that it was THE END OF CIVILIZATION. To what must undoubtedly have been their tremendous disappointment, civilization didn’t end.
Seane-Anna, if you are truly such a beacon of moral uprightness, why don’t you lead the way by transacting yourself to the highest bidder instead of flouting the conventions of your forebears and marrying for love? Go on…walk the talk. We’re waiting.
…Crickets…
Comment by Lori Heine — November 29, 2009 @ 6:04 pm - November 29, 2009
There’s talk here of the “morality” of homosexuality, and that acceptance of the reality of gayness is some how antithetical to “traditional values.” But the reality is is that in every society, in every race, in every culture, in every language group, no matter how you slice it, in every place humankind has gone and settled there is the same small percentage of people who are gay. It seems not to either go up or down, only the ability and willingness to count us does. The argument is really about the “moral” treatment of our small portion of humankind by the vast majority of heterosexuals who understandably do not understand what we gay people ourselves don’t understand — why on earth are we gay people no matter what the “traditional” values and morality are? Gayness, like every other — and I go out on a limb here as a gay man — birth “defect” is simply a part of reality. Just as kids born with missing arms, or blind, or any other “traditional” disability are part of reality. It is the way societies treat the disabled that is the crux of the issue, not whether the disabled will destroy the rest of society.
Comment by Jim Hlavac — November 29, 2009 @ 6:36 pm - November 29, 2009
Sources please! Parents often argued that their children were making bad choices, but Id like to see any evidence of anyone arguing that it should not be allowed.
Also, you are simultaneously arguing that society continually changes while also arguing, like any drug addict, that we can stop any time we want to. Just one more, then we can stop! Where is the evidence to back up your implication?
I wont hold my breath.
Comment by American Elephant — November 29, 2009 @ 7:38 pm - November 29, 2009
I agree! And we are treated well by the vast majority of heterosexuals. No one is trying to outlaw us, or anything we do, we are tolerated, treated with kindness and compassion, none of our civil rights are denied.
There are just some disturbed individuals who have come to terms with being different by lying to themselves and saying they AREN’T different who are now demanding the rest of society accept their delusion as truth rather than coming to terms with who they are.
Comment by American Elephant — November 29, 2009 @ 7:46 pm - November 29, 2009
B. Daniel, I want to thank you for your thoughtful and nice response to my concerns. Jim Hlavac and Lori Heine could learn something from you. But in a sense you still didn’t answer my question.
You say that you don’t want to destroy traditional values, just “expand” them to include homosexuality. What you don’t understand is that such an expansion IS destroying traditional values, for how do you then stop the “expansion” from going any further? That’s the question that I think you’re dodging. How do you demand that the goal posts of morality be moved over for you, but then tell the next person that they shouldn’t and won’t be moved over for him? Oh, you can tell him no, but by what authority would you do so? Tell me why traditional values should be “expanded” for you but not for a straight man who wants to marry two women. Or a father who wants to marry his daughter. Or an adult who wants to marry a child.
Jim above would claim that this slippery slope won’t happen because rational people know the difference between the sensible and the stupid. And I suspect, B. Daniel, that you would agree with him. However, you and Jim consider it sensible to have gay marriage only because you are gay. And you consider legalized polygamy, for instance, stupid only because you aren’t straight men seeking to build a family with multiple wives. In other words, “sensible” and “stupid” are being defined here in a solely subjective and self-serving fashion. And that simply won’t do when the rallying cry behind gay marriage is that people should be free to love and marry whomever they wish. If you really believe that then you have no justification for saying no to the acceptance of any other aberrant sexual/domestic lifestyle. And if you still insist that the slipper slope just won’t happen remember this: a generation ago the idea of gay marriage was abhorrent, now, after decades of agitation by militant gays, it’s considered abhorrent not to embrace gay marriage. If gays can force such a paradigm shift on society, why can’t other deviant groups? Why not? And what will the consequences be? Until there are some real answers to those questions I can’t support gay marriage. I’d rather say no now than cry with regret years later when first graders are reading “Little Heather and Her Lover” or “All Love Is Good: When Mommy and Daddy Are Brother and Sister”
Comment by Seane-Anna — November 29, 2009 @ 9:13 pm - November 29, 2009
“This is not some flash in the pan movement. “
I certainly hope so too, but I think it’s too early to tell. Remember that the left mounted relatively large and vigorous anti-war protests for years (I should know, I counterprotested most of them in WDC) and fat lot of good it did them. I would like nothing more than for these Tea Parties to continue, but we shall see.
The real test, I think, is whether their energy can be channeled into political action. If all people do is go to a Tea party and then go home and holler at the TV then nothing was achieved. If they motivate people to actually get out and campaign (phone banking, door-to-door canvassing) for their favorite conservative candidate, then they’ll have achieved something.
” It shows that the energy on the right is not among the social conservatives seeking to stymie the growing acceptance of gay people in America today.”
I’m pretty active in local politics and as indicated above I’ve been to any number of rallies and such and I have not seen a single anti-gay sign. Conservatives are overwhelmingly against legalized gay marriage, but otherwise gays can do what they want and live with who they want.
Comment by Tom the Redhunter — November 29, 2009 @ 10:15 pm - November 29, 2009
Okay, Seane-Anna and Elephant, here we go again…
Laws enabling monogamous couples to build a home together (which they will do anyway) in a way that protects their children and the property they accumulate together and enables them to adequately care for one another in the event of serious illness ARE conservative laws. They would make society not less stable, but more. Demanding to make an issue of what’s in their panties obscures this.
If you can’t tell the difference between one individual marrying another and one marrying five or six (as used to be the case and — in some countries — still is), then you need a return to first-grade math.
And the drug addict allusion is cute, but irrelevant. And, of course, unnecessarily slanderous.
Stop counting the number of innovations (conveniently stopping short, of course, of those that might require a sacrifice from yourself), as if there is soem magic number we must not exceed, and consider what the innovation would accomplish. In order to enact a law allowing me to marry my alligator-skin suitcase, I believe a hell of a lot of further debate would be necessary.
And if you’re terribly concerned about how polite your reception is going to be when you equate my marrying the human being I love the most in all the world with me marrying a dead cat or something, maybe you ought to consider what you say to others. As your mother might say, “you should hear yourself.”
Comment by Lori Heine — November 29, 2009 @ 10:36 pm - November 29, 2009
Translationi: “I have no evidence, but I am shocked, shocked I say, that you could even question me!”
Why should anyone be able to tell the difference? YOU cant tell the difference between the kind of sexuality that produced every human life on the planet throughout all of human history, and one that can NEVER produce any life, ever, ever, ever, NEVER ever.
You need to return to third grade biology.
Comment by American Elephant — November 29, 2009 @ 11:01 pm - November 29, 2009
Good one, AE! Lori and people like her just make my case. They have NO rational arguments against the slippery slope so they result to insults that make them feel like they’ve won.
My question is really very simple: if the rules can be changed for gays why can’t they be changed for anyone else? Neither Lori, nor Jim, nor the nice and thoughtful B. Daniel, nor any other gay person I’ve had the chance to ask this question to has an answer. Or, rather, they know the answer but don’t want to admit it because that would undermine their cause.
How can Lori say it’s wrong for a man to marry two or more women when she would be apoplectic if someone said it’s wrong for her to marry a woman?
Marriage is what it is. Even in gay friendly cultures like those of ancient Greece and Rome, people understood that marriage was between men and women. Were the ancient Greeks and Romans, then, a bunch of backward, Bible thumping, fascist fiends? Hardly. They just understood what marriage was. It’s time that today’s gays understood it, too.
Comment by Seane-Anna — November 30, 2009 @ 12:02 am - November 30, 2009
Seane-Anna: do you support civil unions? Do you think gays & lesbians shouldn’t be discriminated against? If you answer yes to both questions, I have no problem with you.
Comment by Jim Michaud — November 30, 2009 @ 12:22 am - November 30, 2009
“If the rules can be changed for gays why can’t they be changed for anyone else?”
Seane Anna, numerous people have answered you question, both here and almost certainly elsewhere. It is, by now, an old question that keeps getting asked and keeps getting answered — evidently to deaf ears. You don’t want an answer, won’t accept one, and refuse to entertain even the possibility of one. You are a concern troll with a closed mind, so there it is.
I will again gallantly overlook your pathetic attempt at an authoritative-daddy tone (“young lady, you STILL haven’t answered my question!”) — hilarious as it is — and once again answer your question.
It would not be legally practicable to have monogamous marriages consisting of anybody with any combination of other anybodies. That is why the Mormons were told to stop them, and it is why we have not had them since.
If anybody proposed such a measure, it would be voted down not only by the great majority of straights, but probably most gays as well. Just as it would be voted down if an adult wanted to marry a child (anywhere except for Colorado City), or a dead person or an inanimate object (anywhere except an insane asylum).
They should be changed for gays because we, as a society, have decided that people have a basic and inalienable right to marry for love, so long as the two parties entering into the union are of legal age, not married to anyone else, not close blood relatives, both members of the human species and not dead.
I will ask YOU a question I have asked you before and you refused to answer. Are you really sooooo wrought-up with deep concern about the stability of society that you are willing to give up the right to marry for love?
It can be very reasonably argued that THIS was the straw that really broke the camel’s back. Marriage for love did more to de-stabilize the institution of marriage than any other innovation in history. The heterosexual divorce rate is now well past fifty percent and shooting toward sixty, resulting in countless broken homes, abandoned children and ruined lives.
I’ll tell you where it would make the most sense to draw the line. It would be right there. Were that even so much as suggested by anybody who might be able to make it happen, we’d be able to hear the crying and kvetching of the Seane-Annas of this world clear to the moon.
Oh, you are outraged — simply outraged! — I’m sure. How very RUDE of me to bring this up. You consider us so subhuman that you think nothing of asking why we should want to do what most of the heterosexuals on the planet consider so basic to their lives that they wouldn’t want to live without it.
You obviously believe homosexuality to be a choice, and that we are evil for having chosen it. I will not even attempt to argue with such ignorance. If you are at least sufficiently in touch with reality to understand that it is an inborn trait — totally unchosen and unchangeable — then you are the subhuman one for not being able to understand why we would want to provide some safety and security for our families.
I don’t much care whether you call it marriage, late-for-dinner, pigeon pie or saltine crackers. You might not like very much what I would call your marriage, either.
The home is not only the building-block of civilization for straights. A lot of gays and lesbians want solid, happy, loving homes as well. If you are too contemptuous of us to understand that, then the shame is on your head.
Comment by Lori Heine — November 30, 2009 @ 12:29 am - November 30, 2009
The truth is there is no logical reason why the rules would not be changed further, the only possible reasons are arbitrary. And because the law doesn’t tolerate arbitrary, the slippery slope is a very real problem.
I understand all this very well, and I’m a homo.
Comment by American Elephant — November 30, 2009 @ 12:40 am - November 30, 2009
There, fixed it for you. I’m sure you weren’t TRYING to lie, and that your statement was dishonest thoroughly by accident.
As a matter of fact, the Supreme Court of these United States has decided by rejecting Baker v. Nelson on the merits that people DO NOT have an inalienable right to marry people of the same sex. Only the opposite sex.
Whats more, marriage law has NOTHING to do with love. NO state in the union even asks the reason the couple are marrying and they certainly dont test the couples to see if they are in love.
Comment by American Elephant — November 30, 2009 @ 12:49 am - November 30, 2009
Lori, you’re making some good points. As a gay marriage supporter, the main area where I might disagree with your comments as written is in the notion or language of marriage being a “right”. The commitment of the two individuals to each other is a right, i.e., it resides in their own freedom of action (assuming they are not breaking commitments made to others). But the State license for it, or for anything else that States may license, is not a right. It’s a creation of government that potentially burdens third parties, hence, it should be legislated democratically, including restrictive qualifications to meet public policy goals. That is the basis for the State / the People setting qualifications for the marriage license to exclude incestuous or pedophilic couplings, bigamists and so forth.
I would emphasize that the above applies to straight couples who get State marriage licenses, as well as gay ones. (Even the Loving decision, I believe, spoke of heterosexual couples having an important “freedom” to marry rather more than a “right”.) No one is born with a right to a State license for anything. States license heterosexual couples as “married” before the law because doing so is good policy, or in the interest of society. It benefits society to have adults pair off in these stable little mutual-welfare units known as “new families”, which may or may not then proceed to procreate and/or raise children. Likewise, it is good policy for the State to exclude the incestuous, the polygamous, etc. for various reasons. I argue for gay marriage on the basis that including gay couples (as long as they meet the other qualifications – i.e., not being incestuous, etc.) in the institution of State-licensed marriage is rather better public policy than not. I’ve seen some people go into conniptions when I argue that, but I don’t view their conniptions as my problem.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — November 30, 2009 @ 3:21 am - November 30, 2009
That is an interesting argument structure. I don’t endorse it, for reasons I am about to make clear. Neither does any State in the Union test any couple for their fertility – for example, whether the man has had a vasectomy, or whether the woman is too old to conceive – or for their intent to refrain from aborting all their potential pregnancies – even though certain non-intrusive and relevant tests would be easy. By the quoted argument structure, it would have to be true that “marriage law has NOTHING to do with procreation or children” – an absurd conclusion. Of course marriage law has to do with children. Providing a stable environment for children is one of the two key reasons why State-licensed marriage is such good public policy. (The other key reason being, of course, to provide a stable environment for the couple, whether or not they proceed to have children or are capable of children.)
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — November 30, 2009 @ 3:33 am - November 30, 2009
Back on the Tea Parties:
While I’m not a conservative (gay or otherwise), I agree with the comment. The 1992, Pat Buchanan anti-gay “culture war” approach has proved to be a loser for the GOP, time and again. There are many areas where social conservatives and other kinds of conservatives (e.g., libertarian conservatives) can make common ground. While the American people are not necessarily “pro-gay” (i.e., pro-Gay Left), they are definitely “anti-anti-gay”. It’s wonderful to see the Tea Parties emphasizing fiscal issues and other common-sense issues, and so being devoid of anti-gay approaches that can’t and don’t work in America.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — November 30, 2009 @ 4:00 am - November 30, 2009
No. ILC, “some people” go into conniptions because you argue contradictory things and then spend weeks lying and redefining English to try to escape being wrong.
You argue on one hand that gay couples are equal in all material ways to some married couples (which would mean they are entitled to equal treatment under the law), then, when you get caught in that contradiction, argue that they’re not “exactly” equal. BUT THEN you refuse to define any way in which they are different that would enable the state to lawfully discriminate against them, aside from being the wrong gender to reproduce….
WHICH is exactly what I said, and what you denied, from the very beginning
In short, people go into conniptions because you’re a sleazy liar who is STILL trying to weasel out of being wrong.
And that folks, is why ILC stands for “I Lie Constantly”
Oh, and by the way
Wrong again! Every one of us is born with the inalienable, Constitutionally protected right to equal treatment under the law, and as such, if an institution exists we are born with the RIGHT to equal access to it.
Wrong again! You just pull this stuff out of your butt. Perhaps if you would actually READ the things you shoot your mouth off about, you wouldn’t box yourself into situations where you are defending falsehoods with your unending lies. (Or God forbid, you could actually learn how to admit when you are wrong!)
To the contrary, Loving specifically calls heterosexual marriage a right, quotes precedent referring to it as a right, and cites several other cases that establish that, indeed, equal access to the institution is a RIGHT:
Undoubtedly you will now try to redefine any number of words used in the decision to somehow claim that you never said what you said and have actually been consistent all along — cus that’s what you do….LIE CONSTANTLY
Please stop trying to save face. And please stop trying to smear people who, unlike you, DO tell the truth. I’m not going to allow you to. And unlike you, I have truth on my side and have all along.
Comment by American Elephant — November 30, 2009 @ 4:11 am - November 30, 2009
Yeah… Except, of course, that I don’t.
(Emphasis added) Yeah… except, of course, that I don’t.
What I have argued, is that gay and lesbian couples are -reproductively equivalent- (phrase chosen carefully and used consistently) to infertile straight couples. That is, both kinds of couple can raise children (e.g. adopted), and can procreate in certain conditions with the assistance of outsiders and technology. That’s what I’ve argued.
And, there they are. The conniptions. Enough said. The conniptions are not my problem, so it’s no sense attempting a rational discussion with them. The silliness of AE’s claims should be fairly self-evident. For example, I said:
And AE responded with:
…thus comparing apples to oranges, since “the inalienable, Constitutionally protected right to equal treatment under the law”, which I acknowledge, *is not* a State-created license – that’s the point. That kind of silliness.
As for Loving: I could point out how AE’s own quotation of it uses the phrase “freedom to marry”, and that Loving’s use / creation of the now-popular phrase “freedom to marry” is what I was talking about. But again – no sense in my trying to reason with the conniptions.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — November 30, 2009 @ 4:40 am - November 30, 2009
For those who may be rational and interested -here’s Wiki on Loving:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loving_v._Virginia
Wiki gives a slightly fuller edition of AE’s quote:
Note that Loving puts the word “rights” in quotes, there. In context, it’s not scare quotes exactly, but showing that Loving is quoting someone else’s voice… then in its own voice, Loving chooses terms like “freedom” and “liberty”. That’s the kind of thing I was talking about.
I’m sure it’s possible to extract sentences from Loving where it talks in its own voice of marriage as a “right”. I never said that they never did; only that Loving used other terms more, in order to avoid establishing a State marriage license as a “right” in the sense I mean (something too fundamental and individual to continue being a privilege with qualifications that the People do have a right to set to exclude gays and lesbians). Later jurisprudence seems to have agreed with my view. As Wiki puts it,
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — November 30, 2009 @ 5:08 am - November 30, 2009
Thus: one view accepted in United States jurisprudence is that the key holding of Loving was this:
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — November 30, 2009 @ 5:21 am - November 30, 2009
Re: Gay “marriage” — all this argument about loving and procreation and all is, frankly, beside the point.
I’ve been saying for quite some time now that the problem lies in the fact that the state is involved in any of this in the first place beyond enforcement of contract.
Back to first principles.
I would support civil unions. I would even go so far as to support the removal of “marriage” from all laws, and replace it with the term “civil union”. We would make it clear that in no way does this “un-define” the word “marriage” — make it abundantly clear that what is going on is that the government is not going to define what is and what isn’t a marriage in accordance with the first amendment. Marriage would then be legally fall under the umbrella of Civil Unions.
Ultimately, it is not for the government to decide what is and what is not called a marraige, it is up to us as a society, or more precisely, a collection of sub-societies living freely under the umbrella of the constitution.
When the word “marriage” was written in to laws, it was “marriage” as understood by a nearly homogeneously Judeo-Christian society. Society clearly (if you count votes around the country) does not want to expand the definition of that word, which passing gay “marriage” laws would effectively do. If you take another poll on support of civil unions for gays that are not officially, legally called “marriage”, support for them goes way up.
If the the “state official” definition of “marriage” is legally expanded to include unions of which a majority of the population is tolerant of but doesn’t necessarily want accepted (tolerence and acceptance are not synonymous!), you run into the problem of my kids being taught that it is the same thing in the government text books, when I may, in fact, strongly believe that it is not and I do have the right to pass my values to my children. On top of that, due to the stupid “hate crime” laws, even clergy can be prosecuted for preaching the beliefs of his particular flavor of relgion (this has actually happened in some European countries). It’s a clear violation of multiple parts of the first amendment.
So I say to gays, go, have a ceremony, call it whatever you like, including “wedding”, “marriage” … and file your contract with the state as heterosexual couples do. States, accept the evidence of contract. But as far as the state is concerned, it is a civil union — because frankly the state has no business deciding whether or not or when I get married or you either. I would accept this for traditional marriages as well. My priest, preacher, justice of the peace, whatever — me, my family, my friends, we’ll all call it marriage. When we file our paper work with the state — it’s a legal contract called a “civil union”. Fine by me.
Others are free to reject and condemn you (or me) according to their beliefs. But if they assault you, steal from you, or break any other laws to express their condemnation in such coercive ways, there are laws that cover that. These laws enforce tolerance. There should be no laws enforcing acceptance. Acceptance is up to each individual’s conscience.
Comment by philmon — November 30, 2009 @ 11:06 am - November 30, 2009
That all being said, I agree about the Tea Parties, being a tea-partier myself.
I am sure there are people who are “anti-gay” there. Most of them are tolerant. A lot of them are accepting. And of course, there are always a few who are neither. I’m sure if you looked you’d probably find a sign or two among thousands that express sentiments that probably shouldn’t be expressed in that setting.
They should welcome gay patriots while not, perhaps, accepting their gayness — which is only one component of the person — if they believe it is wrong. We should come together for what we believe, and perhaps argue politely and privately amongst ourselves on the sidelines if we so choose.
I have found that most Christians are “hate the sin, not the sinner” people, and I expect them to live up to it. Most do.
And then, of course, there’s the Westborough type people, which is an entirely different story.
Comment by philmon — November 30, 2009 @ 11:13 am - November 30, 2009
philmon, good comments. I would accept civil unions for gays. Heck, I’d even accept the law calling them “civil unions” for gays and “marriage” for straights. Because, as I’ve been saying, when we’re talking about a State license for something – marriage, professional practice, driving, fishing, anything – No one is born with a right to it; the People do get to set relevant qualifications for it, to meet public policy goals.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — November 30, 2009 @ 11:32 am - November 30, 2009
“Whats more, marriage law has NOTHING to do with love. NO state in the union even asks the reason the couple are marrying and they certainly dont test the couples to see if they are in love.”
Elephant, I’m sure YOU’RE not trying to lie, so I’ll give your disingenuousness the benefit of a doubt.
Marriage LAW may say nothing about love, but marriage CUSTOM (as you and everybody else well knows) is totally based upon love — unless an immigrant is marrying a citizen in order to come here legally or something of that sort.
ILC, as far as people having a “right” to marriage, I concede that point. Straight people don’t have a right to it, either, though they certainly act as though they do. What I should have said is that we have (as does everyone else) a right to the pursuit of happiness. Which includes the right to safeguard our homes and our possessions and enter into whatever relationship we choose that does not exploit a minor or in any other way violate another’s rights.
As for Elephant’s remarks that “ILC” means “I lie constantly,” I suppose this is yet another example of an anonymous person hiding behind a computer screen and insulting someone in the safety of cyberspace. I always enjoy your posts, and I’m not afraid to use my full, real name to say so.
I don’t much care, as I have already said, what a legal union between two people might be called. And as for a court ruling that these two must be of the opposite sex, it is doomed. The same way the Dred Scott Decision was doomed. I believe too much in this country to believe otherwise.
Comment by Lori Heine — November 30, 2009 @ 2:11 pm - November 30, 2009
Actually, in addition to the right to pursue happiness (though it is a fact of human life that no one can be certain they’ll catch up to it), the rights of which I spoke in my previous posts are property-oriented.
I don’t begrudge anyone else the right to marry. But my tax proceeds should not be redistributed to them on the basis of some mythopoetic specialness granted their union by people with religious beliefs different than my own.
My church celebrates same-sex unions. I would also disagree that their tax money should be re-routed to help support my union.
The government needs to get out of the business of doing anything more than safeguarding basic rights. The great cathedrals of Europe are empty of all but tourists largely because each of those countries has a state-funded church. That is a concept that fails to excite people across the pond, and probably (thank God) doesn’t excite too many here.
Elephant, Seane-Anna or who the hell ever has every right to believe what they do about the mystical sanctity of marriage. They should not be granted the “right” to expect me to subsidize their beliefs with my tax money, or confiscate more taxes from me because the laws are rigged to suit them.
The notion that two people must be of opposite sexes to marry is based upon religious beliefs, which were the basis of the custom in the first place. The shift in marriage law from polygamy to monogamy was based upon a change in popular religious belief from the Old Testament notion that a man deserved as many wives as he could afford to one we thought reflected the New Testament (even though polygamy was still legal in NT times).
Societies that permit polygamy to this day share a feature no one here has yet discussed. They forcibly suppress the freedom of women and deny even their most basic rights. We don’t need to worry about people here (with the exception of a few nuts) ever clamoring for legal polygamy because women here would never permit it.
Next time Seane-Anna takes one of her fanciful trips back to ancient Greece or Rome, perhaps she should consider what life was like for women who could not even be citizens of their own country. Not every innovation in the law is the same as every other. If we can’t use our heads well enough to understand that, then we probably don’t deserve to have a country anymore.
Comment by Lori Heine — November 30, 2009 @ 3:11 pm - November 30, 2009
At the risk of belaboring the point, I have a further thought on this. Barry Goldwater, in “The Conscience of a Conservative,” writes that “Circumstances do change. So do the problems that are shaped by circumstances. But the principles that govern the solutions to the problems do not.”
Society as a whole can only benefit from permitting same-sex couples to protect their assets, safeguard the futures of their children and enforce the promises they make to one another. These promises, in marriage or civil union, are made not only to each other, but to society itself.
Society can in no way be improved by encouraging some people to merely “shack up,” without the benefit of any legal protection for the arrangement. By encouraging them to think of their relationships in the long-term sense, it is helping them to become the responsible citizens conservatives claim they want everyone to be. There is nothing flamingly liberal about this.
Certainly we need to look closely at what we’re doing as we make changes. But drawing a line at allowing couples to honor their commitment to one another, while not allowing free-for-alls involving several people (which would be not an innovation but a regression) is hardly the crazy notion some people seem to think it is.
Comment by Lori Heine — November 30, 2009 @ 5:57 pm - November 30, 2009
I agree with that as a principle. I also see the case in favor of a ready-made licensing scheme or legal institution whose existence and accessibility encourage people to pair off. I think it tends to improve the participants (on average – please don’t laugh), and their kids if any, benefitting the whole society.
Let’s put it this way. In my quest to have a government that returns to safeguarding basic rights – namely individual rights to life, liberty and property – there are some things I’d like to concentrate on before others. I’d like to concentrate onending $1.4 trillion deficits and redistributionist taxation and crushing burdens on entrepreneurs and on rights of private property. Seane-Anna tells us that social conservatives can agree on those things. Socially conservative, fiscally liberal folks like Huckabee and Bush tell a different story, but I hope Seane-Anna is right about that and I’ll take the help of any responsible person who is willing to fight for a smaller government.
Yikes, I finally found someone else who notices that. Male-centered polygamy, though encouraged by the Bible, is something our society should not permit because it implicitly denies what should be the equal dignity and liberty of the sexes. While gay marriage (or civil unions) implicitly upholds them.
Agreed.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — November 30, 2009 @ 10:03 pm - November 30, 2009
I don’t begrudge anyone else the right to marry. But my tax proceeds should not be redistributed to them on the basis of some mythopoetic specialness granted their union by people with religious beliefs different than my own.
Myths are, as the saying goes, the explanation of the cause for what is observed empirically.
In this case, it’s pretty straightforward. Opposite-sex couples produce children. Without children, society collapses. Hence, opposite-sex couplings are something which the encouragement of by society is fundamental to society’s survival.
Gay sex? Not so much.
Society as a whole can only benefit from permitting same-sex couples to protect their assets, safeguard the futures of their children and enforce the promises they make to one another.
However, based on the reductionist view elucidated above that governmental recognition is tax redistribution and inherently destructive, then it would seem wisest to recognize as few relationships as possible, and only those that are inherent to the survival of society.
Opposite-sex relationships are; same-sex are not.
I do not understand this whole concept of requiring same-sex relationships to be recognized in the same fashion as opposite-sex. They are not the same. Their structure, function, and societal impact are not the same. They do not contribute the same degree of value to civilization. The fact that we treat them differently is no more discriminatory in the perjorative sense than are age classes in the Senior Olympics.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — December 1, 2009 @ 2:43 am - December 1, 2009
“The fact that we treat them differently is no more discriminatory in the perjorative sense than are age classes in the Senior Olympics.”
In states where same-sex couples’ arrangements are not protected under the law at all, they are not simply “being treated differently.”
There is no conscionable reason why I could visit my spouse’s bedside in many hospitals even when she was at the point of death. Nor that I have to spend thousands — perhaps tens of thousands — of dollars in extra legal fees just to safeguard our financial relationship. Nor that in some states, children are living in foster homes who could be living with loving same-sex parents (a separate issue, I know, but certainly still a related one).
No matter how they got here, do those kids not still exist?
Perhaps we should consider human beings as something other than agricultural produce or livestock on a farm.
I don’t happen to agree that because I haven’t “reproduced,” I am useless, without value, or devoid of the right to legally protect my home and everything I’ve worked hard for all my life. If that is all that the small but no-less-significant portion of the population in this country that is same-sex-oriented are worth, then surely my Christian faith cannot genuinely be to blame for it.
Comment by Lori Heine — December 1, 2009 @ 2:57 am - December 1, 2009
Lori,
You complain about ‘legal fees’ I look at them this way, it’s the cost of doing ‘non-recognized’ relationships. My roommate/partner has her DNR notices in order, and I hold her POA, I’m remiss in not doing the same for myself, but I’ve adjusted my insurance to take care of her in the case of my death. If I didn’t have her, I’d likely set up the paperwork through my step-sister, as she’s my closest relative.
The state does not have the right to intervene in a contract between you and a partner (no matter what the courts say). It also has no obligation to recognize a partnership. Whether it be yours or mine.
I’ve said it before. You have the exact same privilege to enter into a state-recognized contract with one person of your choice, subject to the rules and regulations of the state of residence, that I do. The fact that neither of us avail ourselves of that doesn’t change the equal access under the law.
Comment by The_Livewire — December 1, 2009 @ 6:48 am - December 1, 2009
*Sigh* “I Lie Constantly” never fails to live up to his earned nickname! Just like when Obama says “What I’ve always said is”…you know that whenever ILC says he has “consistently” said something, that he is lying through his teeth and is about to twist and re-qualify his position, redefine some English, misquote some people, and lie in every conceivable way to say something hes never said before.
He has learned that it is FAR easier for him to rattle off a laundry list of lies than it is for people to call him on them.
Unfortunately for him, however, I have decided that someone needs to! And with proof.
For example:
ILC Lie #1:
Oh, but YES YOU DO: HERE is ILC (5th paragraph) arguing that Merriam Webster, Dictionary.com, and a dozen other online dictionaries are all WRONG about the definition of the phrase “nuclear family” and that he, not the dictionaries, is correct.
and HERE is ILC redefining the word “reproduction” to mean something gays can do with one another and alternatively to mean gays adopting a third party’s child.
And in terms of contradicting himself, ILC has argued that gays are “reproductively” exactly the same as some couples who are already married, (except of course straight couples get pregnant when everyone told them they couldnt. Something that CANNOT happen to gays), and he has also argued that gay couples are just as good at raising children as mothers and fathers are…BUT, while arguing that gay couples are equal on every measurable level to some married couples, and while he specifically rejects the claim that gays are of the “wrong gender for procreation” he STILL argues that gays do not have a right to equal treatment under the law when it comes to marriage because he claims heterosexual marriage is NOT A right.
A claim that is SPECIFICALLY rejected by the Supreme Court.
ILC Lie #2:
Oh, but YES YOU DO: Here YOU are, specifically going back and correcting my summation of your argument to make it accurately reflect YOUR opinion:
ILC edited, and ILC approved. Now ILC claims he never said it!
Ah, but ILC never means “exactly” what he says. There is always some new twist that he claims is what he’s “consistently” said all along — just like Barack Obama’s: “what I’ve always said is…” and Bill Clinton’s “it depends what the meaning of “is” is”
As he does again here in ILC LIE #3:
Yes, you have argued that many times, and you always go stunningly silent when it is pointed out to you that:
1. Millions of “infertile” straight couples still get pregnant with their own children, and ZERO gay couples can, or ever have, and
2. straight couples of ANY reproductive ability remain one of each of the sexes necessary for procreation, while NO gay couple in the history of the world is of the two sexes necessary to procreate. Indeed, you claim that gay couples CAN procreate (by redefining the word procreate to mean adopt)
Ignoring arguments that disprove yours, and pretending as though they were never made is one of your most frequent tactics and is a lie of omission.
ILC LIE #4: He now claims that Equal Protection does NOT APPLY to state licenses, but first he has to lie about what I said, by once again intentionally editing out the point that refutes his position:
But of course I wasn’t comparing apples to oranges, I was making the obvious point that equal treatment under the law applies to government licenses, which is why ILC had to lie about what I said. What I ACTUALLY said was:
Which the liar ILC edited out because
1. its irrefutable,
2. it disproves his dishonest argument, and
3. its one of the many dishonest tactics ILC regularly, habitually, pathologically employs.
ILC LIE #5:Now ILC raises a complete straw man about Loving v Virginia, pretending that I somwhere claimed the decision didnt talk about freedom, which I never did:
When what I refuted was his FALSE claim that Loving didn’t establish a RIGHT to heterosexual marriage. The decision SPECIFICALLY said it was a right, even quoting precedent. He increasingly tries to whitewash this claim — like always — spinning it and spinning it and spinning it every time I prove him wrong
Here is one of the MANY times he claims marriage is NOT a right, even for straight couples
And yet when he has Loving v. Virginia crammed down his sleazy, pathologically dishonest throat — In which the Supreme Court SPECIFICALLY says multiple times that marriage is a RIGHT, he tries to spin like mad to claim the Supreme Court didn’t mean what it specifically said!
WHich brings us to…
ILC LIE #6:Now the pathological liar, ILC, laughably tries to claim SCOTUS didnt really MEAN that marriage is a right, because it put the word in quotes:
1. NO thats NOT what you were talking about! You specifically said, MANY times that marriage is not a right.
2. So now ILC is either telling another blatant lie, or he is pathetically ignorant of judicial reasoning because Judges and Justices QUOTE PRECEDENT WHEN THEY WANT TO EMPHASIZE A POINT, and emphasize that it is established law, not their own opinion — not to diminish it by putting it “in someone elses voice”. Thats WHY legal opinions are so LONG to begin with, because the Judges and Justices are citing all the precedent that BACKS UP their opinion, not diminishes it by “using someone elses voice”
Holy cow! This is the level of lies ILC regularly stoops to in his pathologically dishonest attempts to win arguments. Now ILC has redefined “legal precedent” and “stare decisis” to mean WEAK argumentation, and language without citation to be the strong part of the opinion!
Sonia Sotomayor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg just fell in love with ILC!
ILC LIE #7:
Yet more lies! He has constantly said that even heterosexual marriage isn’t a right.
ILC LIE #8:
Well, that’s just incoherent gobbledygook, but the gist appears to be that when Loving said marriage was a RIGHT, they didnt really mean you had a right to GET married. He appears to be desperately trying to establish some pathetic, laughable, embarrassingly dishonest difference between civil marriage and a civil marriage license.
To which the only answers are:
1. PATHETIC! and
2. SOURCE Please! …Once again you are claiming an authoritative source says the OPPOSITE of what it actually says. So point to the language in the decision that tries to “avoid establishing a State marriage license as a “right” when it specifically says marriage IS a right.
which brings us to….
ILC LIE #9: Attempting to bolster his ridiculous argument that a right to heterosexual marriage (which he repeatedly argues does not exist anyway) does NOT include a right to a marriage license, ILC bizarrely quotes a Wikipedia entry about a State court decision that RECOGNIZES that Loving establishes a right to heterosexual marriage and explains why there is NOT a similar right to gay marriage.
Indeed, if you read the original decision, it, like the vast majority of other decisions make all the same arguments I have been making all along and REFUTES EVERYTHING ILC has been saying
Indeed, I must thank ILC. For on the rare instances that he has attempted to cite sources, they have invariably supported my arguments and refuted his own.
This decision is no exception. Indeed, it reads like a laundry list refuting everything ILC has ever argued and supporting most points I have made.
So once again the very source ILC cites actually refutes his own arguments, while doing absolutely nothing to bolster his bizarre argument that a RIGHT to heterosexual marriage doesnt include a right to a marriage license.
I love pointing out what a self-contradictory liar ILC is! And I thank him for making my job so much easier!
ILC LIE #10:
Notice also how ILC quoted the article, leaving out the argument that contradicts him, and conveniently FORGOT TO LINK TO IT.
A trademark move of the pathologically dishonest ILC. Take a quote out of context, don’t link to it, then hope nobody Googles it to find out that you are misrepresenting it!
I, on the other hand, go to great lengths to provide sources, which ILC cannot, but please notice that when I do, ILC misrepresents those too:
ILC LIE #11: Even though I LINK DIRECTLY to the FULL TEXT of Loving v. Virginia, and ILC only links to partial quotes at Wikipedia — he tries to imply that HE is providing full information that I am trying to hide…
…a longer version of what I already linked to in full, but which does absolutely nothing to bolster ILC’s incredibly dishonest arguments.
And ILC tells ALL these lies in just two posts! Its no wonder he lies so much! He has learned that if he lies, and twists, and spins, and misrepresents, and redefines long enough, that he can wear everyone out.
But unlike ILC I have the truth, the states, the people, their legislatures, their statutes, the Constitution, the Supreme Court, the appellate courts, the vast majority of state courts, the dictionaries, Google, and even his own prior statements, and his few pathetic attempts at sources on my side.
He has his lies and weaselly spin.
But guess what ILC, EVERY time YOU try to bring this up again (because it is ALWAYS you who brings it up), in another attempt to save your dishonest face and smear others, I am going to be right there, documenting for everyone your extensive history of lies with full sourcing and links.
Not that it will stop you from lying. Anyone who argues that a stack of online dictionaries are wrong, that citing precedent is actually WEAK judicial reasoning, and that a “right” to marriage doesnt mean a “right” to a marriage license is a person who will not stop lying for any reason whatsoever.
You have been thoroughly discredited yet again.
Comment by American Elephant — December 1, 2009 @ 10:20 am - December 1, 2009
Society benefits in any number of ways when people pair off and settle down with each other. I’m not saying your points are entirely wrong; I’m saying that even if your points are entirely true, it’s still a good idea for a society to have, in law and custom, some sort of ready-made institution or relationship path for gays as well as for straights. If enough people agree with you not to call it marriage, well OK.
Also note that our society is currently in the contradictory (not to say dysfunctional) position of providing a ready-made institution for childless, infertile, and even “anti-child” straight couples, but not for gay and lesbian couples who may be raising children for some very good and legitimate reasons.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 1, 2009 @ 10:26 am - December 1, 2009
AE, I’ll say it again. Heck, I’ll even try to offset it this time or surround it with stars, so you get the point.
Just because you ***imagine*** or ***fantasize*** that the meaning of my words or arguments was X, does not make it so.
There is one person in our “discussions”, AE, who has lied often. It is you. You consistently, willfully misinterpret and misrepresent me. I have caught you in telling outright lies about me on any number of occasions. That is your prerogative. That is, you are entitled to disgrace yourself. And you do. And you know it. Your flailing, screeching responses reek of desperation, and you know that also.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 1, 2009 @ 10:35 am - December 1, 2009
See, thats the difference between you and me ILC,
****I BACK EVERYTHING UP, WITH SOURCES FOR EVERYONE TO SEE, INCLUDING YOUR OWN WORDS**** (see, I can use asterisks too)
Every argument above is thoroughly sourced with your own statements, and the proof that refutes your lies.
You are the liar, I have proven it again, and again and again
****YOU CAN NEVER BACK UP ANY OF YOUR ARGUMENTS, AND WHEN YOU TRY, YOU ONLY END UP REFUTING YOURSELF AND PROVING MY POINT*****
all of which is thoroughly documented above.
You are a pathological liar, and I can prove it til the cows come home.
Comment by American Elephant — December 1, 2009 @ 10:49 am - December 1, 2009
I mean, man oh man. You triumphantly link this:
Of course, AE. ***In this very thread, I again claim that a State marriage license is NOT a right for straight couples***. See #19. I have been claiming it publicly, long and consistently. You offer it now as some sort of triumphant finding, which condemns me? Man, that’s flailing. (And a sign of long-standing incomprehension of my most basic arguments.)
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 1, 2009 @ 10:51 am - December 1, 2009
(or if not of incomprehension, then of willful misrepresentation – take your pick)
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 1, 2009 @ 10:52 am - December 1, 2009
MORE LIES! You claim that a state marriage license isnt a right, while ACKNOWLEDGING (and then trying to twist) that LOVING V VIRGINIA explicitly, specifically says it IS A RIGHT.
Then of course you try to argue that it doesnt really mean its a right because its “in quotes”
Comment by American Elephant — December 1, 2009 @ 11:03 am - December 1, 2009
Or did you want to explain to everyone why they shouldn’t trust PRECEDENT because its in quotes???
Or did you want to explain how Merriam Webster and a stack of online dictionaries are wrong about what words mean and YOU are more authorotative???
Or maybe you want to explain why you have NEVER provided ANY source from ANY state, ANY legislature, ANY vote of the people that agrees with your definition of the purpose of marriage to society?
Indeed, perhaps you want to explain why the court decision YOU JUST CITED upholds my definition of the purpose of marriage, and does not uphold your definition?
Or perhaps you want to explain how Loving v Virginia explicitly says that marriage is a right, yet you claim it doesnt mean people have a right to a marriage license
Again…you are a PATHOLOGICAL LIAR and I have proven it over and over again with your own exact words.
The latest of which is extensively documented in #36
Comment by American Elephant — December 1, 2009 @ 11:06 am - December 1, 2009
Its ALL there, with links to your exact words and the information refuting your lies. in #36
Comment by American Elephant — December 1, 2009 @ 11:07 am - December 1, 2009
I’ll keep this comment as brief as possible so it can not be nit-picked to death. The government should get OUT of the business of determining which consenting-adult couples can protect their relationships and which ones cannot — as well as which citizens may gleefully pick the pockets of others.
All taxation is confiscation. It is theft. It may be “necessary” in some cases, but when statists jump into the fray, it always becomes about who should be able to pick the pockets of whom.
I will fight to the death to keep thieves out of my pocket. I will do it any way I can. The current marriage laws allow straights to steal from gays by confiscating our tax money to give them tax breaks, and this should readily be seen as immoral by any American still capable of rational thought.
I thought I was making this clear enough before, but evidently I wasn’t.
If we in this country do not somehow recover our ability to fricking THINK — before the powerbrokers have managed to hoodwink us out of absolutely everything — this country is going down. Oh, wait…it already is.
We can follow the Seane-Annas and Elephants of the world and set our hair on fire and throw our clothes off and scream about slippery slopes every time a new question comes before us, or we can be the grownups in the room and actually THINK about where the line deserves to be drawn. Some of the people on this thread are actually attempting to do that, while others are merely calling people names and behaving like kindergarteners.
North Dallas is a good man, and he gets savaged on a lot of commentary threads. I understand that a lot of bloggers have censored him by banning him from their sites. Too bad — I don’t agree with a lot that he has to say, but I won’t forget that when my mother passed away, he was one of the first people to send me condolences.
I will remain a human being when I comment on this blog, or I will go elsewhere. The kiddies can now feel free to step back in and call me dirty names.
That’s America in the Twenty-first Century? Wow, are we headed for a fall…
Comment by Lori Heine — December 1, 2009 @ 2:35 pm - December 1, 2009
And cute! (I don’t know if you’ve met him.) Anyway, reasonable people are never going to agree on everything – I’m sure you disagree with some of what I’ve had to say, Lori – but the above would be yet another point where you and I can agree. Thank you for showing up here and saying what you’ve had to say.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 1, 2009 @ 4:13 pm - December 1, 2009
The government doesn’t prevent ANY consenting adults from protecting their relationships.
You are the only one being disingenuous. You just called me disingenuous and then AGREED that exactly what I said was true!
Marriage law has nothing to do with love. And the “marriage custom” you are referring to, are the reasons people get married. Which the government NEVER asks ANYONE.
Wow, you act just like ILC! Calling people names while simultaneously pretending that you arent calling anyone names, and are the only mature one rising above it.
Birds of a feather.
The problem is (other from the lie that you arent calling names), is that calling ILC a liar is a statement of demonstrated and demonstrable fact. Which has once again been very extensively documented above in #36.
Don’t lie like ILC, Lori Heine, and I wont call you a liar.
Comment by American Elephant — December 1, 2009 @ 4:30 pm - December 1, 2009
Wow. Just wow. Thanks, ILC, for your comments, too. Glad to see there can be some grown-up commentary here.
Elephant, you are one petty, childish little person. I’m so sorry all the mean straight boys beat you up so often when you were a kid that you feel you’ve got to run around with a chip on your (anonymous cyberspace) shoulder forever. A dyke may knock you on your ass if you call her a liar in person, but — hey — hiding behind a keyboard and doing it makes you feel so big and macho!
Dream on. You are a master hairsplitter. With a suspicious, malicious little mind like yours, you’d make a perfect bogus-conservative politician. Just like the nut-house that remains of the GOP, you will, no doubt, continue drooling and babbling on.
Wow? Did I just lie again? But I’m rubber and you’re glue, so there, poopyhead!
A lot of us have moved on from gradeschool, Elephant. Too bad you can’t.
Comment by Lori Heine — December 1, 2009 @ 5:32 pm - December 1, 2009
Okay, so I won’t be brief. Get with it, Elephant! Call me a LIAR!
You know, stereotypes are often unfortunate and unfair. I don’t believe that all gay conservatives are toadies, or that they all hate themselves. That charge is leveled, usually, by people who don’t know any gay conservatives and haven’t really listened to why others believe differently than they do.
But every stereotype does contain some element of truth, and sometimes it is true. People like Elephant seem to hope they’ll bow and scrape and denigrate themselves and others like them until those who hold us in contempt finally realize we can be nice and housebroken and LIKE us — really, really like us — after all.
I have no desire to placate bigots. There are people who troll on blogs like these, just hoping to see how low they can drag us in our own defeatism. I know a lot of straight conservatives, and most of them are very decent and honorable people. They don’t show up on sites like this and sneer at us, challenging us to prove we’re really worthy of being treated like human beings.
Elephant, it’s probably fortunate you don’t care about getting married, because what self-respecting gay man — however conservative — would want to marry you? You’d probably follow him through the house, screaming “liar, liar!” at him every time you had an argument.
I’m sure you’ll probably take another hit on the rage-bong and come roaring back for more. I have no idea what made you like that. But like some of the other people you goad and sneer at online, I really don’t care.
Comment by Lori Heine — December 1, 2009 @ 6:47 pm - December 1, 2009
WOW is right, you have just spent FIVE paragraphs insulting me while simultaneously praising your own supposed maturity.
while accusing me of “splitting hairs” because I showed that you called me a liar at the same time you CONCEDED that i was telling the exact truth.
No wonder you come to ILC’s defense! Birds of a feather, flock together!
YOU dear, are the one who needs to grow up, and yes, STOP LYING
and by the way, your threats of violence are duly noted as well.
Please try it! I am more than happy to call you a liar in person. You are one, and I showed it.
So you join ILC in telling lies, and call names while claiming you dont, then threaten violence and then have the gall to complain!
You have utterly discredited YOURSELF.
Comment by American Elephant — December 1, 2009 @ 6:49 pm - December 1, 2009
“Please try it! I am more than happy to call you a liar in person. You are one, and I showed it.”
I live in Phoenix, Arizona. Ask around anywhere in the gay Christian community, and you will quickly find out how to reach me. Look me up and you will see your hope fulfilled.
Comment by Lori Heine — December 1, 2009 @ 7:53 pm - December 1, 2009
Lori, another point where we can easily agree.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 1, 2009 @ 8:18 pm - December 1, 2009
As for AE: Lori, I think you’ve figured him out and don’t let him bother you.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 1, 2009 @ 8:29 pm - December 1, 2009
Yes, hopefully you have, Lori.
I dont tolerate liars, even when they threaten violence like a trapped animal, as you did Lori.
ILC on the other hand, will tolerate any level of dishonesty and any new low in behavior in order to try to save his discredited face.
You and ILC have both been clearly shown to be lying through your teeth (see #36 and #47 above), its no wonder two proven liars would support eachother. Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama stick up for each other too.
Unfortunately for you both, all the actual evidence agrees with me. And thats the only support that really matters.
I hope you both grow up, quit lying, and learn to admit when the facts contradict you. Hell, even Andrew Sullivan is now more honest than ILC and Lori.
Comment by American Elephant — December 1, 2009 @ 11:26 pm - December 1, 2009
AE, if you’re finished, I’d like to have a conversation with Lori and ILC, thanks.
No warning necessary. I have long experience with both and feel quite confident that I understand from where they’re coming.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — December 2, 2009 @ 12:05 am - December 2, 2009
That’s your interpretation. If Lori really wants to threaten violence she can certainly go on to do so; but her words thus far stated only how dykes in general (not necessarily her) should want to respond to your abuse, AE.
You, on the other hand, threatened in effect at the end of #47 to subject her to your screeching abuse if she won’t toe your line.
As for me: Once more, AE, the only one of us to tell lies in these “discussions” has ever been you. As I’ve demonstrated on several occasions, your only “evidence” has ever been your own consistently stupid, flailing and desperate misinterpretations of people’s words (mine and others’).
With each new comment, you disgrace yourself further. And you know it. That is why you screech at each new individual on this blog whom you cannot intimidate.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 2, 2009 @ 12:16 am - December 2, 2009
Whether or not I’ve finished is entirely up to them, NDT.
I sure hope so, but experience with them suggests otherwise. Ive tried dropping the subject many times in the past only to have ILC wrap everything up by telling more lies about me. Not going to let him do that anymore.
And believe it or not, I know where they’re coming from too. They are coming from the conviction that it would be good for society if gays were to also marry. Which is a thoroughly respectable position.
Too bad they have disgraced it so much with so many lies defending fallacies rather than just having the integrity to own up to being wrong.
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 12:30 am - December 2, 2009
LOL,
Once again ILC proves me right!
Like clockwork that one!
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 12:31 am - December 2, 2009
Tell us ILC, if you’re not lying, please tell us again how precedent should be dismissed because its “in quotes”!
then please explain how you “never said” that Loving V Virginia DIDNT establish a right to marriage even though you have always argued there is no right to a marriage license!
How exactly can someone have a right to get married, but not have a right to a marriage license, again? Oh, and you claimed that SCOTUS was trying to say exactly that. So please SOURCE where they tried to say it. Or are you claiming that United States Supreme Court Justices, at the very top of their professions, were unable to articulate what you, in your infinite honesty and brilliance, can state in one sentence!?
You are a joke.
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 12:43 am - December 2, 2009
Yikes – NDT, you are absolutely right and I apologize for having “fed” AE at all.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 2, 2009 @ 12:49 am - December 2, 2009
LOL, once again ILC gets cornered with his lies, and searches desperately for an “out”
He CANNOT justify saying that we should dismiss precedent because its “in quotes” and should instead favor parts of judicial decisions that ARENT backed up with precedent:
So he IGNORES the fact that he is cornered, and tries to disguise it by attacking me faster than Obama can blame Bush!
SPIN ILC! SPIN! SPIN! SPIN!
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 1:03 am - December 2, 2009
The people of rationality and goodwill on this blog, AE, know that I explained my views at #19, #20, #21, #23, #24, #25, #28, #32, #37. And that I’ll be pleased to answer any further questions they have.
You, on the other hand, don’t know it. Heh.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 2, 2009 @ 1:05 am - December 2, 2009
No you didn’t. Which is why you are DESPERATELY avoiding answering. Because you are caught at being a pathetic liar.
Please explain, which you never have, why we should dismiss precedent, the very benchmark of judicial reasoning because it is “in quotes” as you say, but should instead favor reasoning that is NOT backed up with precedent.
SPIN ILC! SPIN! SPIN! SPIN!
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 1:18 am - December 2, 2009
Again, Elephant, you have my name and my city of residence. It’s a big city, but the gay Christian community there is rather small. I am very easy to find if you want to back up your big talk with action.
I will not tolerate bullying from you or anyone else. You sit there behind your alias, safe in cyberspace, and talk like you think you’re John Wayne. You are a joke.
You are the one who began using the word “liar” to describe other people here. You obviously have some mental problem connected with that charge. I don’t know if Daddy used it on you when you were a child, or what, but please seek professional help about your compulsion with using it against other people the way a caveman would have used a club.
Your next favorite seems to be “grow up.” You might try heeding your own advice. You sound like you’re about to blow up and splatter all over your computer screen, and that wouldn’t be very pretty. For an “elephant,” you’re certainly making a donkey of yourself.
Seriously, you are one messed-up dude. Get help, as soon as possible. And if you don’t want to get married, again…on behalf of a lot of very fortunate gay men, I can only say, “Thank God for that.”
Comment by Lori Heine — December 2, 2009 @ 2:08 am - December 2, 2009
ROFL
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 2, 2009 @ 2:27 am - December 2, 2009
YOU are the only one trying to bully, Lori. Here you are again, threatening violence:
I merely said I am happy to say everything to your face that I have said here online, to which you AGAIN try your intimidation tactics:
I made no big talk. YOU did. Twice.
Like a cornered animal, you rage and threaten. Because you long ago AGREED that I was correct. So its all you can do.
Grow up.
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 3:46 am - December 2, 2009
MEANWHILE….
Even though ILC has been monitoring the room for an hour and a half according to the timestamps of his statements, waiting for someone to come along and help him (if past performance is any indication, he probably emailed her himself) he STILL CANT explain why we should dismiss precedent, the very benchmark of judicial reasoning because it is “in quotes” as he says, but should instead favor reasoning that is NOT backed up with precedent:
Because there IS no good explanation for it, because its obviously wrong, so he must refuse to answer that very straightforward question.
When ILC cant SPIN SPIN SPIN, he ignores ignores ignores! But he can never simply admit he was wrong. He would rather put everyone through months of arguing than admit he was wrong and I was right.
Here let me help you ILC. Try saying this:, “Youre right, of course citing precedent is the strongest form of judicial argument, not a weaker one, and I, ILC, was wrong to suggest otherwise in my endlessly dishonest attempts to win an argument.”
It will at least be a start!
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 4:05 am - December 2, 2009
The people of rationality and goodwill on this blog, AE, know that I explained my views at #19, #20, #21, #23, #24, #25, #28, #32, #37. And that I’ll be pleased to answer any further questions they have.
You, on the other hand, don’t know it. Heh.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 2, 2009 @ 8:24 am - December 2, 2009
It is not “threatening violence” to remind you, Elephant, that if you spoke to people in person the way you do in cyberspace, you would get your butt pretty soundly thrashed.
If I didn’t know you were stupid before, I do now. One wouldn’t need to be a dyke to teach you a lesson about getting impertinent with strangers. My very-straight sister, nearly sixty years old, could and would break you in half if you made the mistake of doing that to her.
Men don’t talk that way, even to other men, in person. A hundred years ago, a man would have dragged you out into the middle of the street and cut your tongue out with a bullwhip for calling him a liar simply because you disagreed with something he’d said. And your being gay wouldn’t have had to have anything to do with it. Straight men don’t shoot their mouths off like that, either.
That’s why people are more civil to each other in person.
And again, you know how to find me.
ILC, I’m sorry you keep getting kicked around like that. I don’t see a blog link to your name. I would have clicked over and read more of what you had to say if I’d found one. NDT hasn’t posted anything new over at his blog since about August, and I haven’t seen anything from him at Lloydletta’s blog, either. I miss hearing from him.
I guess Seane-Anna is gone, which is sort of a pity. I merely pointed out that if she’s straight and married, she has her hand in our pockets, and I guess that made her slink away. The libertarians have a way of putting things in plain terms, and that clears the mind. I must confess that for a while, I hoped Obama would really do something worthwhile and I forgot that.
These are desperate times. They’re making people like Elephant go psycho (or was he always like that?). We need to keep our sense of humor. Sometimes all we can do is point and laugh. And sometimes, when confronted by someone like Elephant, we actually get something to laugh at.
Comment by Lori Heine — December 2, 2009 @ 3:14 pm - December 2, 2009
You really do exacerbate all the negative stereotypes about both liberals AND “dykes” to use your word, dont you Lori!
You lied and are now raging and frothing at the mouth that you were called on it. You’ve even ADMITTED that I was telling the truth WHILE you were calling ME a liar, so your explanation that I deserve to be threatened with violence because I called you a liar, is just another of your many disingenuous ravings.
Its very simple, if you dont want to be called a liar, don’t lie.
I dont call Bruce or Dan or NDT, or Livewire, or Leah, or Ashpenaz, or even Tano, or anyone liars but you and ILC, and I dont call people liars without being able to prove my case, as I have in both of yours.
Real men prove their cases Lori, as you and ILC are unable to do. Real men back up their arguments with sources and ILC has REFUSED to do.
Real men also call each other liars all the time. We have a court system where it happens millions of times every day. But real men dont do so without being able to prove their case.
And real men certainly dont threaten violence when they are proven to be lying. Thats what cowards, and apparently lesbians do.
Now seriously, grow up, stop lying, and stop raging for being called on it.
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 6:48 pm - December 2, 2009
ILC you know nothing of good will and even less of honesty, so please don’t presume to tell anyone what people of good will will do.
Good will is having the manhood to admit when you are wrong not lying that Supreme Court cases citing precedent should be dismissed because the are “in quotes”
You have not and cannot explain it, so you SPIN and IGNORE!
But what does anyone expect from a “man” who claims all the online dictionaries are wrong and he is right!
what does anyone expect from a “man” who REFUSES all requests to show any state or any legislature or any statute or any referendum ANYWHERE that agrees with his definition of the purpose of marriage?
You see ILC, thats why courts quote precedent! because opinion backed up with facts is MORE authoritative than opinions that are not. Its also why I back my opinions up with sources, and why YOU cannot.
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 6:57 pm - December 2, 2009
By the way, your attempts to discredit court precedent are only ONE of the many things you have NOT explained.
You have also not explained how it is you think marriage is a right, according to Loving, even though you have stated many times that it is NOT a right, but you think there can be a right to government marriage without a right to a government marriage license.
and many, many other inconsistencies and self contradictions I have caught you at, BUT!!!! I have learned that you, being a completely dishonest and dishonorable person will use the opportunity of being confronted with multiple lies at once, to invent a new distraction, so PLEASE, lets focus on the lie in question.
Please explain why it is that people dismiss Judicial arguments that cite precedent because its “in quotes” — “not exactly like scare quotes” but apparently somewhat like scare quotes….
People of REAL rationality goodwill and INTEGRITY are waiting ILC.
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 7:11 pm - December 2, 2009
sorry, that should read “Please explain why it is that people SHOULD dismiss Judicial arguments that cite precedent because its “in quotes”
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 7:12 pm - December 2, 2009
“And real men certainly dont threaten violence when they are proven to be lying. Thats what cowards, and apparently lesbians do.”
Elephant, you are so emotionally messed-up that I will allow your latest ravings to stand on their own. They show what a nutcase you are better than anything anyone else could ever say.
You clearly have a pathological case about people supposedly being liars. Whether that’s because someone lied to you once and hurt your poor, little feelings, whether Daddy used to use the belt on you for it or whether it’s because you know it to be your own failing is anybody’s guess.
Like most people, I don’t care.
Come and call me a liar in person. You know how to reach me, now, so if you don’t, you’ll prove who the coward is for everyone to see. I gave my name and how to find me. Cowards do that? You are one yourself, so you can speak only for yourself.
I’ll just wind you up and let you go. On and on, and on and on and on…ad nauseum and — apparently — ad infinitum. You prove what a basket of crazy you are better than anyone else could.
Comment by Lori Heine — December 2, 2009 @ 7:22 pm - December 2, 2009
Yes, you have spent two full days, posting over a half a dozen times to insult and threaten me . Obviously the behavior of a person who doesn’t care.
Another shining example of your deep devotion to honesty! And we all believe you. Now you can show us how much you dont care by going away.
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 8:13 pm - December 2, 2009
meanwhile,
Those of us who do care about honesty are waiting for ILC to explain why he says we should dismiss judicial reasoning that cites precedent because it “has quotes….not scare quotes exactly” BUT apparently similar to scare quotes….
ILC, since you claim you already answered this question, if you dont want to re-write it, you can just quote the part where you answered this question. I looked through all the comments you referred to, and dont see it answered anywhere.
Comment by American Elephant — December 2, 2009 @ 8:16 pm - December 2, 2009
At this point, I’m simply going to let Yellow Elephant continue to play his sad, sick little tape. His mental illness speaks for itself, and I will simply let it.
I’ll leave it on that note. I suspect ILC will, too.
Yellow, you know where to find me. Any time you care to, just bring it.
Comment by Lori Heine — December 3, 2009 @ 12:51 am - December 3, 2009
No, Lori, youre going to try to throw in another insult because after having confessed that I was telling the truth, its all you can do.
now, back to the topic you’ve said like 5 times now that you are done with:
Those of us who do care about honesty are waiting for ILC to explain why he says we should dismiss judicial reasoning that cites precedent because it “has quotes….not scare quotes exactly” BUT apparently similar to scare quotes….
ILC, since you claim you already answered this question, if you dont want to re-write it, you can just quote the part where you answered this question. I looked through all the comments you referred to, and dont see it answered anywhere.
Comment by American Elephant — December 3, 2009 @ 3:34 am - December 3, 2009
I have not “confessed” that you were “telling the truth.” I do not, in fact, even remember exactly which little nit-picky point you’re talking about anymore. Probably no one but you remembers. I’ll bet ILC has moved on.
You have the emotional maturity of a preschooler. I’ve seen people throw temper-tantrums on the ‘net before, but never anything like this.
Since you’re not even smart enough to figure this part of it out, I’ll let you in on a little secret. I stick around just to throw in another jab — because I know you’ll react exactly as you do. It’s fun. People have almost certainly been doing that to you all your life.
You’ve already shown you have absolutely zero sense of humor, so you can’t tell when people are at least half-kidding with you. ILC tried to get you to lighten up, but you just take yourself WAAAAY too seriously.
Your vanity has been injured. The only problem is no one cares. You’re left all alone on stage, bawling and screeching about whichever hairsplitting little point you think you’re right about. You are really a spectacle of pathos.
Oh, do I CARE because I keep coming back? Your Sally Field paraphrase (“You like me…you really, really like me”) was so sweet. I was trying to poke a little more fun at you. My sense of humor may not be your cup of joe, but what the hell…at least I have one.
You’re two of ‘em, and your mother wears Army boots. Psych! Punk! If you had a big red nose, I’d honk it.
You can play on on the stage all alone, or you can just shut up and go somewhere else. It’s very likely all the same to most of us either way.
Comment by Lori Heine — December 3, 2009 @ 1:41 pm - December 3, 2009
P.S.: Yellow…Phoenix Arizona. Anytime. Make my day. Nut up or shut up.
Comment by Lori Heine — December 3, 2009 @ 1:45 pm - December 3, 2009
Hi Lori – Well, I certainly moved on from this thread. Some fun and games erupted in a newer one, leading to Bruce stepping in. I visited your blog, looking for your e-mail but I did not find it. Feel free to email me, ilovecapitalism – at – hotmail.com.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — December 3, 2009 @ 2:21 pm - December 3, 2009
Okay, ILC…my email is coming…
Comment by Lori Heine — December 3, 2009 @ 11:43 pm - December 3, 2009