Was the symbolic "veto" intended to distract from his vetoing of a budget? In any case, Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton sure loves vetoing things:
After laying waste to the GOP's fiscal agenda by vetoing the entire budget, DFL Gov. Mark Dayton followed up by punching a hole in their social agenda.On Wednesday, Dayton vetoed restrictions on abortion and symbolically vetoed a move to put a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage on the 2012 ballot.
R. J. Houck from Roseville writes about a personal experience:
Many of those who favor same-sex marriage are resorting to labeling and name calling of those who favor to retain marriage between one man and one woman. Those who favor traditional marriage are not anti anything, nor are they attacking gay and lesbian people.
It is widely accepted in all societies that traditional marriage of one man and one woman is by far the best environment for raising children to be well adjusted adults and to raise their own children. Traditional marriage, therefore, is not against something, but "for" the most vulnerable in our society, our children.
The gay community must stop labeling those who disagree with them as bigots and worse, and allow the citizens of Minnesota their right to decide this issue at the ballot box.
Some of those at the Capitol demonstration were rude and offensive in calling those who disagreed with them bigots. While standing quietly with a sign in support of traditional marriage, I was called a bigot, which I firmly am not.
They did not know me or what I thought, only what the sign indicated. Who is the bigot?
From Inside Costa Rica:
The Juzgado Segundo de la Familia (Family Court) in San José, rejected the marriage request made last week by the gay couple, Antonio Rodríguez and Eliécer Bermúdez, arguing that the request conflicts with the rules of the Family Code that prevents same-sex couples from marrying.
Judge Arturo Marcheno Rosabal, who issued the decision, noted that paragraph 6 of Article 14 of the Código de Familia (Family Code) states that marriage is legally impossible for same-sex couples and that in this case he had no other alternative but to reject the application.
Speaking of civility and the need for it, also from Sen. Diaz's office:
"I continue to be the target of a vulgar campaign by a seething extremists who oppose my defense of New York's marriage laws.
The latest attempt to publicly attack my integrity is a call for written entries 1000 – 2000 words at a "F*** Ruben Diaz Festival” set to be held on June 11th. An online group called The New Gay is advertises the event: TNG Writing Contest Alert - "F*** Ruben Diaz: Gay Erotica Featuring NYC’s Number One Bigot".
I urge Governor Andrew Cuomo along with my colleagues in the legislature, the media, and all New Yorkers to take a close look at the hard core and vulgar tactics that are being used to change a law in New York State. I urge all to compare my non-violent, peaceful and prayerful rallies to protect marriage and the attempts to humiliate me because of my one vote in the State Senate. Add to that the intolerant onslaught of hate-filled phone calls to my office. Add to that to the death threats and threats against my family that have been duly reported to the FBI and the police departments of New York and Albany.
As a Christian, of course I love those who hate me and I will continue to pray for their souls.
Even though for the most part these attacks remain unreported in the news, the public deserves to know about them. As such, I will continue to document them so my constituent and my colleagues remain aware."
In response to the story about Redwood Heights Elementary School in CA using examples from nature to teach kids about "multiple genders", Michael Lopez comments (emphasis his):
[Fish switching sexes] is absolutely not where you want to plant your flag if you’re trying to convince people — kids or not — that somehow transsexuality or the breaking of sex-based behavior (i.e., “gender roles”) is somehow natural. In the first place, what fish do sexually is completely irrelevant to what we do; it’s the same as an argument that we should all have unisex bathrooms because bacteria don’t have sex. It’s ludicrous.
Furthermore, trying to make these arguments in support of a tolerance agenda is a losing battle. If natural evolutionary sexual behavior is where you want to have your battle, those who argue against such things have nature pretty squarely on their side: the fact that other species have three sexes, or whatnot, means very little. Humans appear to have evolved to be sexually dimorphic, and with certain broad behaviors that signal masculinity and femininity. The fact that fish change their sex naturally just emphasizes the fact that humans don’t.
From the office of New York State Senator Rev. Ruben Diaz:
"It was disturbing today to hear Mayor Michael Bloomberg trivialize the suffering and agony of African Americans during the slave era by comparing it to the push to legalize homosexual marriage.
... There is no just comparison between America’s struggle to overcome the evils of slavery and the promotion of the lifestyle of homosexuality. It is preposterous for Mayor Bloomberg to degrade and minimize the plight of African-Americans in this civil rights struggle by equating it with the effort to push to legalize homosexual marriage.
... Black Americans should not sit back and let Mayor Bloomberg compare the long struggle of their ancestors against American slavery to the current fight for a lifestyle choice. The effort to redefine marriage to include a man and a man or a woman and a woman can never be compared to the struggle against slavery.
Before Mayor Bloomberg attempts to borrow from history for comparisons, he should take a look at the uncivil discourse that is taking place by those whose goals he has embraced.
Black leaders should not allow Mayor Bloomberg or anyone else trivialize their suffering and their history!"
An author attempts male breastfeeding until he has this epiphany:
And then I realized I was missing something essential: a child. For all our assumptions about breast-feeding, the one abiding truth is that it exists to nourish and comfort new life. The walls of gender could be broken down, but without a child to benefit, what was the point?
Vaughn Walker’s successor as chief judge of the Northern District of California, Judge James Ware, will decide Prop 8 proponents’ motion to vacate Walker’s anti-Prop 8 ruling on the ground of Walker’s improper failure to recuse himself from the case.
According to a provocative post published by RENWL—a coalition of supporters of same-sex marriage from a Los Angeles neighborhood—lots of white gays are very concerned that Chief Judge Ware is African-American.
... This is rich: On the one hand, many opponents of Prop 8 maintain (at least publicly) that no reasonable person could question Walker’s impartiality, notwithstanding the fact that we now know that he was ruling on whether he would have a legal right to marry his previously undisclosed long-term same-sex partner. On the other hand, according to the RENWL post, many of these same folks indulge their own irrational suspicions that Ware, because he is African-American, will be biased against them—or perhaps just that he won’t be biased in their favor, as Walker manifestly was.
Following the trend set by NPR, the New York Times gives our President Brian Brown the last word -- in fact, it's the only time they quote him in this article discussing Mayor Bloomberg's support for SSM:
“It isn’t connected with reality, what the mayor is trying to sell,” said Brian S. Brown, president of the National Organization for Marriage, which opposes same-sex unions.
Of course, at the polling booth, defenders of marriage always have the last word.
Harold Fayard at Truthout:
Students should be taught that these two variations in human attraction [homosexual and heterosexual] are no different than variations in hair color, skin color or any other natural variation. If presenting such knowledge means that gay marriage is being taught, then the reply should be that yes, in this manner, gay marriage and gay relationships should be one aspect - one legitimate, proper and happy aspect - of the many aspects of life about which children should know.
... To tell parents that, "[SSM] won't be taught, don't worry," will not persuade them, still less convince them, nor do anything to undo the prejudices and misconceptions that motivate them, not just as voters, but in all the ways that they think, act, and influence their children about the nature of human attraction, love and existence. Their profoundly rooted ways of being and thinking in relation to homosexuality can only be countered by a direct educational approach about what constitutes human attraction - both heterosexual and homosexual. Full equality of life for the LGBT community will be brought about only by a sustained attempt to put forth directly, in public and in all educational venues - whether for children or adults - a discourse about what human life, human sexuality and human attraction are.
U.S. adults, on average, estimate that 25% of Americans are gay or lesbian. More specifically, over half of Americans (52%) estimate that at least one in five Americans are gay or lesbian, including 35% who estimate that more than one in four are. Thirty percent put the figure at less than 15%.
There is little reliable evidence about what percentage of the U.S. population is in reality gay or lesbian, due to few representative surveys asking about sexual orientation, complexities surrounding the groups and definitions involved, and the probability that some gay and lesbian individuals may not choose to identify themselves as such. Demographer Gary Gates last month released a review of population-based surveys on the topic, estimating that 3.5% of adults in the United States identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual, with bisexuals making up a slight majority of that figure. Gates also disputes the well-circulated statistic that "10% of the males are more or less exclusively homosexual."
Americans' current collective estimate -- which is substantially higher than Gates suggests -- is likely driven more by perceptions and exposure than by scientific measurement or reality.
... Americans perceive that there is a large U.S. gay population -- one far larger than is likely reality.
Here is a video report provided by Gallup:
Edward Glaeser is a very distinguished young professor of economics at Harvard University. He writes mostly about urban inequality. But in his Bloomberg column he took the time to lay out how marriage, fertility, and economic growth are related:
... America’s economy has long benefited from its well- functioning labor markets. Our high marriage and fertility rates boost demand for housing, and all its associated expenditures, and steady population growth makes it far easier to pay for social programs, such as Social Security and Medicare. A jobless, marriageless recovery is not something to celebrate.
In the short run, the marriage drop means fewer households being formed -- only 378,000 from 2008 to 2010; this, in turn, keeps the housing market down. If new households were still forming at the 2005 rate of 1.3 million per year, our excess housing inventory would probably go away, and the construction industry would likely be back to normal in no time.
From the Chicago Tribune:
Catholic Charities of Rockford announced Thursday that the agency will halt its state-funded foster care and adoption services Wednesday — the day civil unions take effect in Illinois.
The decision is the first of what could become a domino effect of Catholic Charities leaving the foster care and adoption business to avoid liability if state law requires them to place children with parents in civil unions — either gay or straight.
In Rockford, the decision could displace about 350 foster children served by Catholic Charities and put 58 employees out of work.
Officials cited a lack of clarity in the Illinois Religious Freedom Protection and Civil Unions Act, which does not specify whether religious child welfare agencies must place children with couples in civil unions.
Without a specific provision protecting religious agencies, church officials said, the agency can't risk losing state contracts or facing lawsuits if it turns away gay couples or others in civil unions.
An ACLU lawyer basically admits that failure to provide religious protections will hurt children:
Benjamin Wolf, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois who represents juvenile state wards as part of a court-monitored consent decree with DCFS, said the decision was troubling, especially in Rockford where there is a high turnover of child welfare workers and racial and economic tensions.
"Rockford would not be the place I would've chosen to start these transitions," Wolf said. "I am very sorry that they would give a greater priority to their commitment to continue discriminating than the health and welfare of Illinois children."
Update -- local WREX reports:
An Equality California poll of likely voters found Californians split 45 to 45 about repealing Prop 8. Equality CA argues the "undecideds" will break their way. We think not. They don't really think so either, because they are seeking to delay a vote at least until 2014:
"If everything fell into place the right way, it would be 2012," said Minter. "But I don't think that's too likely."
In the meantime, EQCA, NARAL Pro-Choice America, the Greenlining Institute, and former ambassador and philanthropist James Hormel funded new research on a 2012 repeal of Prop 8.
Pollster David Binder and his firm, David Binder Research, surveyed 900 likely voters, revealing a mix of advances and a need for further progress.
In 2009, a similar survey showed that 47 percent of voters would support repeal of Prop 8, 48 percent would oppose, and 5 percent were unsure.
In 2011, unsure voters doubled to 10 percent. Support for Prop 8's repeal decreased from 47 to 45 percent, but opposition to repeal also decreased from 48 to 45 percent. --BayAreaReporter
Pundits are parsing the loss to the Democrats of NY 26--Jack Kemp's old district--in the special election Tuesday. Fears that Paul Ryan's Medicare plan would hurt seniors was clearly issue number one. But Human Events noted how the candidate Jane Corwin, ran away from social issues that could have helped her:
So it was in New York-26 last night. Were it not for the presence of so-called “Tea Party” candidate Jack Davis (who drew about 9% of the vote) or a Corwin campaign that is increasingly being faulted by national conservative and GOP operatives, the results might have been different.
“The only thing the political consultants advising the Corwin campaign seemed to be able to do smartly was cash their big checks,” said former Rep. Fred Eckert (R.-N.Y.), leader of the state Ronald Reagan forces in 1976 and a onetime town supervisor of Greece, N.Y., (within the 26th District). “It’s too bad there is no such thing as malpractice for political consultants, or Jane Corwin could press charges and the whole dumb gang of them would have to pay fines and serve time.”
Eckert was referring to the failure of the Corwin campaign to bring up what he called “hot-button” topics, such as Hochul’s strong pro-abortion stance, including support for the controversial late-term abortion. In addition, he noted the Democrat’s support for same-sex marriage. Corwin described herself as pro-choice but against any federal funding and late-term abortion. She was also foursquare in favor of marriage as a union between a man and a woman.
Eckert noted that “this district has a strong Roman Catholic population and Hochul is a Roman Catholic. Had the Republicans defined where she stands on those two issues, it might have made a difference.”
