Friday Gay Blogging

DADT, Again

Elaine Donnelley is just amazing. She was, for some reason, invited to testify to the House Armed Services Committee on the repeal of DADT. This report is from Pam's House Blend, citing this piece by Dana Milbank at WaPo:

Inadvertently, Donnelly achieved the opposite of her intended effect. Though there's no expectation that Congress will repeal "don't ask, don't tell" and allow gays to serve openly in the military, the display had the effect of increasing bipartisan sympathy for the cause.

Milbank's quotes from the questioning are priceless.

Timothy Kincaid debunks Donnelley yet again. Steve Ralls has a good post at HuffPo. Queerty has videos, and HRC Back Story has videos and live-blogging.

I hate to say it, but I get a real charge out of someone like Elaine Donnelley getting up in front of a congressional subcommittee and making a total fool of herself. My bad.

Proposition 8

The language of the proposition as it will appear on the ballot in November has been changed significantly. From Boi from Troy:

The State Attorney General and Legislative Analyst have amended the language for Proposition 8’s Title and Summary. The new ballot label now reads:

ELIMINATES RIGHT OF SAME-SEX COUPLES TO MARRY.
INITIATIVE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT

Changes California Constitution to eliminate right of same-sex couples to marry. Provides that only a marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California. Fiscal Impact: Over the next few years, potential revenue loss, mainly sales taxes, totaling in the several tens of millions of dollars, to state and local governments. In the long run, likely little fiscal impact to state and local governments.

Since most voters don’t get beyond what is on their sample ballot, this language is critical.

This stands to boost the "No" side significantly. Do you get the feeling no on in the administration there wants this thing to pass?

And on a related note,

So Who Is Justin Caster?

Apparently he's an actor who is supporting Proposition 8. Jeremy Hooper, being the near-saint he is, has allowed Caster to hang himself in his own words. Here's where the double-speak starts:

I believe that marriage is an institution created by God, a union He designed for one man and one woman. The Bible is very clear on the boundaries God set on marriage, and I will do all I can to uphold His standards. The world is changing around us (which is written about in detail in the Bible), but Christians are instructed by God not to change our beliefs or try and change what the Bible teaches.

My efforts to support Prop. 8 had nothing to do with keeping anybody from enjoying civil rights. We are free in this country, a privilege I hope I never take for granted. With that freedom, I am free to stand up for what I believe.

This is wrong on so many levels it's hard to know where to start. I won't even start on his complete ignorance of what the Bible says about marriage, since I'm not really versed in the Bible. However, even the most casual reading points up the fact that one man/one woman is not in the mix.

The bottom line is simply that Caster, pious words about "freedom" notwithstanding, is, like so many of his fellow-travelers, using his freedom to take away the freedom of others. To Caster, apparently the Constitution doesn't count, although this is a secular country and California is, last time I heard, a secular state: Caster's religious beliefs should be the law of the land. It doesn't matter that many of his fellow citizens don't share those beliefs. And the second paragraph begins with an outright lie: if he's not trying to prevent people from enjoying their civil rights, what is he doing? In case he doesn't understand, Proposition 8 specifically takes away rights that gay couples hold under the California constitution. Caster supports that.

Ini common with most opponents of equal rights for gays, Caster seems to be quite comfortable ignoring the fact that his freedom also includes reponsibility to acknowledge and support the freedom of others. I don't really care what he believes marriage is: in California (and eventually in the rest of the country, once we get the idologues out of the courts), it's a fundamental right guaranteed under the constitution.

And frankly, whining about being called a bigot when you are doing bigoted things doesn't move me in the least. He claims to have gay friends: he must really love them, to treat their dreams as worthless.

However, I'm not going to call him a bigot. I'm not going to call him anything. I think you can draw your own conclusions.

Dessert, courtesy of Queerty: