Sorry for the size on this -- Blogger has decided that I don't need to edit images. Here's a transcript, via Towleroad:
Nate,
I overheard your phone conversation with Mike last night about your plans to come out to me. The only thing I need you to plan is to bring home OJ and bread after class. We are out, like you now.
I’ve known you were gay since you were six, I’ve loved you since you were born.
- Dad
P.S. Your mom and I think you and Mike make a cute couple.
"You're looking at what is the best course society wide to get you the optimal result in the widest variety of cases. That often is not open to people in individual cases. Certainly adoption in families headed, like Chief [Justice] Roberts' family is, by a heterosexual couple, is by far the second-best option," said John Eastman, chairman of the National Organization for Marriage. Eastman also teaches law at Chapman University law school in Orange, Calif.
I'm sure Eastman meant it to be a positive comment, but the way it's being interpreted (at least in the gay blogosphere) is anything but -- the take is that the's slamming adoptive families. Positive or not, I wonder how the Chief Justice would react to being called "second best."
is knowing someone gay. Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) has had a change of heart on same-sex marriage:
Update: Here's an op ed by Portman in the Columbus Dispatch. There is one bit I take exeption to:
The process of citizens persuading fellow citizens is how consensus is built and enduring change is forged. That’s why I believe change should come about through the democratic process in the states. Judicial intervention from Washington would circumvent that process as it’s moving in the direction of recognizing marriage for same-sex couples. An expansive court ruling would run the risk of deepening divisions rather than resolving them.
Um, no, Senator -- people do not get to vote on my civil rights. That's one reason we have the federal judiciary -- to protect those rights from the "whim of the people." (See Romer v. Evans on that score.) I'm perfectly happy to have the courts upholding the right of everyone to marry the person of their choice. That way, if someone doesn't like it, they have to rewrite the Constitution, and as we've seen, it's not that easy. Not even for marriage.
There's a fair amount of irony in the piece, if you know anything of Portman's record (consistently anti-gay). I'm sure it's unintentional.
Physicists announced Thursday they believe they have discovered the subatomic particle predicted nearly a half-century ago, which will go a long way toward explaining what gives electrons and all matter in the universe size and shape.
The elusive particle, called a Higgs boson, was predicted in 1964 to help fill in our understanding of the creation of the universe, which many theorize occurred in a massive explosion known as the Big Bang. The particle was named for Peter Higgs, one of the physicists who proposed its existence, but it later became popularly known as the "God particle."
Here's the part that stopped me:
"The preliminary results with the full 2012 data set are magnificent and to me it is clear that we are dealing with a Higgs boson, though we still have a long way to go to know what kind of Higgs boson it is," said Joe Incandela, a physicist who heads one of the two main teams at CERN, each involving several thousand scientists.
"What kind of Higgs boson it is." Now there's some fine-tuning.
This is sort of mind-blowing, in a good sort of way -- as I always say, the more we learn about the universe, the more fascinating it becomes.
Strangely enough, I can't seem to find a picture of it.
Colorado's civil unions bill has passed both chambers of the legislature and now goes to Gov. John Hickenlooper, who has said he will sign. The vote in the House was rather lopsided -- 39-26.
Illinois GOP party chairman Pat Brady has survived an attempt by James Oberweis to oust him for his support of the Marriage Fairness Etc. Act -- the special meeting Oberweis called for that purpose has been cancelled. Looks like Oberweis didn't have the votes. I honestly don't think that was ever going to happen -- the GOP fringe doesn't have a lot of traction here, and Oberweis seems to make a lot of noise and not deliver. And on same-sex marriage in particular, it's not that there's overwhelming support, but there's not overwhelming opposition, either. Remember, Peter LaBarbera couldn't get enough signatures on an advisory referendum petition to even file the damned thing.
PolicyMic says there are twelve states that will legalize marriage by the end of next year. Here's their layout. (Cancel that -- follow the link for the table. Blogger has decided to be an asshole and won't let me put in the image at a decent size.)
It turns out the much-touted Regnerus study was intended as a political tool from the very beginning. From American Independent:
The conservative funders who bankrolled a flawed and widely cited academic study that's critical of gay marriage choreographed its release in time to influence “major decisions of the Supreme Court,” documents show.
The documents, recently obtained through public-records requests by The American Independent and published in collaboration with The Huffington Post, show that the Witherspoon Institute recruited a professor from a major university to carry out a study that was designed to manipulate public policy. In communicating with donors about the research project, Witherspoon’s president clearly expected results unfavorable to the gay-marriage movement.
It gets worse. Read the whole article.
Based on the timing, the fact that it was fast-tracked for publication (James Wright's claim that he had no idea of the political angle is disingenuous, at best), the active involvement of a member of Witherspoon's staff in the data analysis (and that Regnerus lied about that), it was obviously meant as a political move. It's nice to have the evidence.
It's also worth noting that an amicus brief filed by the American Psychological Association, among others, thoroughly debunks the study.
Via Joe.My.God.
Update:Here's the report, with thanks to StraightGrandmother via J.M.G.
Update II: Here's a discussion of the history of the project, as revealed by the documents, by Philip Cohen. (With thanks to StraightGrandmother yet again.)
A discovery that moves our ancestry back just a little bit -- like 200,000 years. From New Scientist:
Michael Hammer, a geneticist at the University of Arizona in Tucson, heard about Perry's unusual Y chromosome and did some further testing. His team's research revealed something extraordinary: Perry did not descend from the genetic Adam. In fact, his Y chromosome was so distinct that his male lineage probably separated from all others about 338,000 years ago.
"The Y-chromosome tree is much older than we thought," says Chris Tyler-Smith at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in Hinxton, UK, who was not involved in the study. He says further work will be needed to confirm exactly how much older.
Here's the abstract to the published study at The American Journal of Human Genetics:
We report the discovery of an African American Y chromosome that carries the ancestral state of all SNPs that defined the basal portion of the Y chromosome phylogenetic tree. We sequenced ∼240 kb of this chromosome to identify private, derived mutations on this lineage, which we named A00. We then estimated the time to the most recent common ancestor (TMRCA) for the Y tree as 338 thousand years ago (kya) (95% confidence interval = 237–581 kya). Remarkably, this exceeds current estimates of the mtDNA TMRCA, as well as those of the age of the oldest anatomically modern human fossils. The extremely ancient age combined with the rarity of the A00 lineage, which we also find at very low frequency in central Africa, point to the importance of considering more complex models for the origin of Y chromosome diversity. These models include ancient population structure and the possibility of archaic introgression of Y chromosomes into anatomically modern humans. The A00 lineage was discovered in a large database of consumer samples of African Americans and has not been identified in traditional hunter-gatherer populations from sub-Saharan Africa. This underscores how the stochastic nature of the genealogical process can affect inference from a single locus and warrants caution during the interpretation of the geographic location of divergent branches of the Y chromosome phylogenetic tree for the elucidation of human origins.
on the Orson Scott Card/Superman controversy that I've seen so far, from Alyssa Rosenberg at ThinkProgress. The designated artist, Chris Sprouse, has withdrawn for what seem to be intelligent reasons:
“It took a lot of thought to come to this conclusion, but I’ve decided to step back as the artist on this story,” Sprouse said in a statement released Tuesday. “The media surrounding this story reached the point where it took away from the actual work, and that’s something I wasn’t comfortable with."
Emphasis on "took away from the actual work." He's right on the nose with that one. Rosenberg's comment:
This strikes me as one of the best possible outcomes we could have hoped for in this case. I know a lot of people would have liked to see Card summarily dismissed, but that seems like a decision that could have made him a martyr for people who don’t actually understand how First Amendment rights function, and might have limited the incident to a one-off, requiring more organizing the next time a comics company hired Card to write a title. What Sprouse’s decision does is illustrate something more useful: a shift in the market that suggests Card isn’t a good choice to work with because his active work to ban equal marriage rights and to recriminalize homosexuality make it impossible for his work to stand alone as fiction.
I'm in agreement with Rosenberg's stance: I have no patience with those who were calling for DC to "fire" Card -- I mean, he was signed for two issues, FTLOP. "Fire" him? But Rosenberg picked up on the key point in Sprouse's statement, which I haven't seen from any other commentator (even me!): there's too much baggage for the story to be stand alone. People will be coming into this loaded for bear, and that's not what DC is after, I think. DC has been a little slow to pick up on the cultural shift regarding gay rights, but maybe they'll figure it out eventually.
Two Detroit-area nurses filed a lawsuit to try to overturn restrictions on adoption by same-sex partners. But at the judge's invitation, the case took an extraordinary turn and now will test the legality of a 2004 constitutional amendment that stipulates Michigan only recognizes marriages between a man and a woman.
U.S. District Judge Bernard Friedman will hear arguments in the case Thursday at a Detroit law school, although he hasn't indicated when he'll make a ruling. If he concludes the amendment violates the U.S. Constitution, gay-marriage supporters say same-sex couples would immediately be allowed to wed and adopt children.
State officials, however, predict "potential legal chaos" if the judge throws out the gay marriage ban.
It's interesting that it's the judge who suggested challenging the marriage ban. It's also interesting that the judge is a Reagan appointee. (Although the political party of those on the bench hasn't seemed to have made much difference in these cases.)
The "potential legal chaos" argument is funny -- as in, that's all you can come up with? Seems to me it would clean up a lot of issues in Michigan's family laws. And the best the state can come up with is the same tired old arguments that have failed in every case so far:
In a court filing, the Michigan attorney general's office said there's no "fundamental right to same-sex marriage."
"Michigan's marriage amendment bears a reasonable relation to legitimate state interests," the state said. "Michigan supports natural procreation and recognizes that children benefit from being raised by parents of each sex who can then serve as role models of the sexes both individually and together in matrimony. Plaintiffs fail to allege facts showing there is no rational basis for these legitimate state interests."
Yeah, sure. None of those "interests" has anything to do with excluding same-sex couples from marriage. It would be refreshing if one of these briefs had some contact with reality, instead of being based on someone's personal prejudices.
This is pretty interesting. I'm probably going to go see Oz the Great and Powerful tomorrow, and James Franco is someone who's crept onto my radar. Stick around for the end.
I think I'm going to start posting these on Fridays (or Mondays, or whenever they come out) -- a nice, concise summary of the state of marriage equality.
I find myself leaving comments on other blogs lately more than I'm posting here, so I thought I'd include links to a few of those stories that elicted a response, even if I didn't always post it.
I always wonder just how this is supposed to happen -- with nearly 7 billion of us on this planet, how are we supposed to go extinct if the government recognizes my (alas, at this point only hypothetical) marriage?
I lit into the commenters on this one -- there were a couple who just don't want to accept what is obviously a sincere apology and attempt to do better. Question posed to them: What has happened to you in your life that you're convinced everyone is lying to you?
I couldn't watch more than 47 seconds of the video -- it took him 20 seconds to lie about gays and pedophilia. He's a disgusting person, but there are some good comments.
You may have seen a story about Lech Walesa's bigoted remarks about gays and transgenders. The Polish parliament made what I think is an appropriate response. I didn't comment -- it's hardly necessary.
I've noticed a lot of people bitching and moaning that the Administration's brief in support of the Respondents in the Prop 8 trial didn't call for repealing all anti-marriage laws and amendments. I just ran across this in a transcript of his press conference yesterday that states why:
Q And given the fact that you do hold that position about gay marriage, I wonder if you thought about just -- once you made the decision to weigh in, why not just argue that marriage is a right that should be available to all people of this country?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, that's an argument that I’ve made personally. The Solicitor General in his institutional role going before the Supreme Court is obliged to answer the specific question before them. And the specific question presented before the Court right now is whether Prop 8 and the California law is unconstitutional.
And what we’ve done is we’ve put forward a basic principle, which is -- which applies to all equal protection cases. Whenever a particular group is being discriminated against, the Court asks the question, what’s the rationale for this -- and it better be a good reason. And if you don't have a good reason, we’re going to strike it down.
And what we’ve said is, is that same-sex couples are a group, a class that deserves heightened scrutiny, that the Supreme Court needs to ask the state why it’s doing it. And if the state doesn't have a good reason, it should be struck down. That's the core principle as applied to this case.
Now, the Court may decide that if it doesn't apply in this case, it probably can't apply in any case. There’s no good reason for it. If I were on the Court, that would probably be the view that I’d put forward. But I’m not a judge, I’m the President. So the basic principle, though, is let’s treat everybody fairly and let’s treat everybody equally. And I think that the brief that's been presented accurately reflects our views.
Any questions? Anyone?
Via C&L.
Digby also has some thoughts on Obama's evolution, with a link to this analysis by bmaz at Emptywheel. Bmaz is another who called for total repeal, now, but he also cites a quote from Ted Boutrous, an attorney for Respondents, that lays out what I think is the Administration's thinking:
Their arguments from start to finish would apply to other states,” he said. “The argument of the day (against same-sex marriage) is the responsible pro-creation argument. The United States takes it apart piece by piece. It’s those same types of arguments that are used in other jurisdictions to justify the exclusion of gays and lesbians from marriage.
But fortunately, the office of the City Attorney of San Fransico beat me to it. A list of all the briefs filed in support of the Respondents (that's the good guys) in Hollingsworth v. Perry, with links to PDFs.
Everyone seems to be focusing on that, from the Administration's Prop 8 brief. What they're missing, I think, is two-fold: the Fourteenth Amendment argument lays a strong foundation for finding all those 30-odd marriage amendments and state DOMAs unconstitutional, even if the Administration isn't calling for that specifically. (And it can't really -- given its position on states' rights in its DOMA brief, and Obama's stated position that he'd rather leave it to the states, that would be ludicrous.) If the Court accepts that argument, it leaves all those laws and amendments even more vulnerable to challenge than they already are.
What's really important is the call for heightened scrutiny of anti-gay laws in general, which is what the scrutiny argument boils down to. If the Court decides that gays as a class fall under the criteria for heightened scrutiny -- and not only the Administration's brief, but AFER's as well, make a very strong argument for that, as do the filings in U.S. v. Windsor -- those state anti-marriage amendments are toast.
Remember, this is Obama we're dealing with. He's a strategic thinker, not a tactician, and doesn't lay all his cards out. He's setting up a game-plan while maintaining his states' rights stance on marriage. I really wish he wouldn't do that, but he does.
That was the sound of yet another shoe dropping. The Justice Department has filed a brief in Hollingsworth v. Perry in support of the Respondents (Perry, et al.) It's a good strong one, based on 14th Amendment Equal Protection requirements and calling for heightened scrutiny.
Update: If you don't believe me, here's the New York Times:
The Obama administration threw its support behind a broad claim for marriage equality on Thursday, and urged the Supreme Court to rule that voters in California were not entitled to ban same-sex marriage there.
In a forceful argument, the administration claimed that denying gay couples the right to marry violates the Constitution’s equal protection clause. It said that Proposition 8, the state’s ban on same-sex marriage, should be subjected to “heightened scrutiny” — a tough test for any law — and stated flatly that “Proposition 8 fails heightened scrutiny.”
Please note that the mainstream press is aiding and abetting this whole propaganda effort.
Via David Atkins at Hullabaloo.
And here's Digby on the public response to actual plans for dealing with the mess that is the sequester.
that weighing in before the Supreme Court on DOMA and Prop 8 has become very fashionable. Here's a nice summary from Bloomberg.
The administration has filed a brief opposing DOMA. Now everyone's waiting to see if they will jump in on Prop 8.
On a side note, the Executive Committee of the Illinois House has passed the marriage bill, although by a closer margin than I like -- 6-5. But then, this is after some really hateful testimony from all the usual suspects. Now on to the full House. Jeremy Hooper has a clip of some of that testimony.
This post by John Aravosis at AmericaBlog on one of the front-runners for pope -- Cardinal Peter Turkson of Ghana, who is not only a homophobe but a racist as well.
Cardinal Turkson was asked about the Catholic church’s ongoing pedophile scandal, and whether there was a chance the scandal might spread to Africa – most of the cases have been in western Europe and America.
Turkson’s response included two basic parts:
1. The pedophile scandal is really a gay scandal.
2. It’s a white thing, so black Africa shouldn’t have a problem.
The ignorance revealed by these statements is staggering. I often wonder that contemporary Africans are so brain-washed that they strenuously try to maintain the worst aspects of colonial rule, claiming them as "African traditions."
Read the whole thing -- it's pretty appalling. The only hopeful note is that if they elect someone like this joker as pope, the Church is finished in the West. Of course, that doesn't bode well for Africa. Latin America, which Aravosis points to as the other big Catholic region, has a distanced relationship with the Church, largely a reflection of its history: the Church was firmly on the side of the oppressors and seems to have as much influence politically as the Church in the U.S. and Europe, which is to say next to none.
That was the sound of the other shoe dropping: the administration has filed a brief in Windsor arguing that Section 3 of DOMA is unconstitutional. Here's the full document, which I can't embed.
This is the first time that an administration has filed in support of the rights of same-sex couples. Not bad for a president who is arguably one of the worst, if not the worst, for civil rights in history.
They demolish the Proponents in the first five pages. I can hardly wait to see how Cooper responds to this. He might as well stick his head in a wood chipper.
Mississippi has ratified the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution -- that's the one that bans slavery. That brings the state firmly into the last half of the nineteenth century.
"This" being the ongoing attempts in Washington to destroy what's left of the middle class and turn the good ol' U. S. of A into Nicaragua ca. 1930. Read Digby's posts from yesterday if you want to raise your blood pressure, here, here, here, and here.
Meanwhile, the Washington press corps, who theoretically are those in the best position to keep us informed about these shenanigans, are outraged at lack of access to the President -- while he's playing golf.
The whole damned country's turned into one huge game of Trivia.
"Though grave and terrible sins have been committed, our Lord teaches us to turn the other cheek and forgive those who sin against us," said the pope, reading a prepared statement from a balcony overlooking St. Peter's Square. "That is why, despite the terrible wrongs they have committed, the church must move on and forgive these children for their misdeeds."
"As Jesus said, 'Let he who is without sin cast the first stone,'" the pope continued. "We must send a clear message to these hundreds—perhaps thousands—of children whose sinful ways have tempted so many of the church's servants into lustful violation of their holy vows of celibacy. The church forgives them for their transgressions and looks upon them not with intolerance, but compassion."
I am not being called to serve Jesus in humility. Rather, I am being called to something deeper--to be humiliated, disgraced, and rebuffed by many.
I was not ready for this challenge. Ash Wednesday changed all of that, and I see Lent 2013 as a special time to reflect deeply upon this special call by Jesus.
To be honest with you, I have not reached the point where I can actually pray for more humiliation. I'm only at the stage of asking for the grace to endure the level of humiliation at the moment.
In the past several days, I have experienced many examples of being humiliated. In recent days, I have been confronted in various places by very unhappy people. I could understand the depth of their anger and outrage--at me, at the Church, at about injustices that swirl around us.
Thanks to God's special grace, I simply stood there, asking God to bless and forgive them.
We report. You decide.
Footnote: Chris in Paris has a run-down of just how arrogant, hypocritical and self-serving the Church has been throughout the molestation scandals.
Janet Mefferd. I haven't mentioned her here yet, but she seems to be one of the more out-there bigots in a population known for its lack of acquaintance with rational thought. This little screed is so patently ridiculous that one begins to think she's doing satire -- except I suspect she doesn't understand satire at all.
“Everything is so upside down in our society now and right and wrong have completely switched where what is really wrong is to say you shouldn’t have two boys allowed to go to the high school prom.
“Now we can get into a big issue of the public schools are morally bankrupt at this point and we all ought to exit and just let them, let them do their thing, and that may be the ultimate answer; on the other hand, I feel for these Christian kids who are in a prom or kids who are at this high school who say, ‘you know something, do we have to go down this road?’
She went on to suggest that some Christians would not want to see gay couples, and asked why gay rights should “trump” the rights of Christians not to have to, reports Right Wing Watch.
“Whether the homosexual activists like it or not, and I know this isn’t politically correct to say this, but not everybody wants to see that. I know that that’s offensive to the activist crowd, they want us all to see it, they want us all to approve of it, they want us all to call it blessed and okay and rejoice and have parties and throw confetti in the air over this whole thing. But the fact of the matter is it’s a moral issue.”
The moral issue here, as far as I can see it, is the tendency to portray other human beings as abstractions, to remove their humanity so that one can safely treat them as objects. And the idea that anyone has a "right" not to have to see something that might be offensive -- which is a growing trend among self-styled "Christians," although seldom so baldly stated -- is ludicrous. It's part of the attempt to cast criticism of their nastiness as a violation of their right to free speech. Sorry -- no one has a right not to be offended.
The scary part is that people actually listen to her. Without laughing, I mean. What's even scarier is that some of them think this kind of word salad actually makes sense.
Oh, and Ms. Mefferd? "If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out."
When she was campaigning to become the next U.S. senator to represent Massachusetts, Democrat Elizabeth Warren pledged that she would take her tough talk about enforcing Wall Street regulations to Washington and put them into action.
On Thursday, as Senator Warren got the opportunity to question regulators at her first Senate Banking Committee hearing, she bluntly asked "When did you last take... a large financial institution, a Wall Street bank, to trial?"
Here she is in action. Something tells me the regulators weren't ready for this.
I am so glad Elizabeth Warren is in the Senate. We need more like her.
Gay rights activists with a vendetta against masculinity are behind plans to cut wrestling from the Olympic program, the coach of a London 2012 gold medal-winner told R-Sport on Tuesday.
The International Olympic Committee’s Executive Board voted Tuesday to cut wrestling from the list of 25 confirmed sports for the 2020 Games and forced it to reapply as part of a group of eight sports fighting for a single place.
“If they expel wrestling now, that means that gays will soon run the whole world,” coach Vladimir Uruimagov said, calling the decision “a blow to masculine origins.”
He added: “It turns out this committee is headed by representative of these minorities," clarifying that he meant sexual minorities.
The Senate passed the marriage equality bill 34-21. Now it goes to the House, where passage is probable, but not completely assured. If it all works, we'll have marriage equality in Illinois by May.
The professional gay-bashers are foaming at the mouth, but notably absent is any comment from Peter LaBarbera, who you will remember was so ineffective as head of the Illinois Family Institute that he couldn't get enough signatures on an advisory referendum to even submit it.
Joe.My.God. has a reaction from one opponent, Sen. Kyle McCarter. He also has a bit of McCarter's background.
John Aravosis has been reporting on this for a few days. It marks a particularly bone-headed move on AP's part, almost on the order of threatening legal action if anyone quotes one of their stories. Here's the bones, via Jim Romenesko. From the first leaked memo:
From: AP Standards
Sent: Mon 2/11/2013 2:45 PM
STYLE WATCH
SAME-SEX COUPLES: We were asked how to report about same-sex couples who call themselves “husband” and “wife.” Our view is that such terms may be used in AP stories with attribution. Generally AP uses couples or partners to describe people in civil unions or same-sex marriages.
Tom Kent
Dave Minthorn
That's outrageous enough, but here's the "fix":
SAME-SEX COUPLES: We were asked how to report about same-sex couples who call themselves “husband” and “wife.” Our view is that such terms may be used in AP content if those involved have regularly used those terms (“Smith is survived by his husband, John Jones”) or in quotes attributed to them. Generally AP uses couples or partners to describe people in civil unions or same-sex marriages.
WTF? That fixes something? Excuse me gentlemen -- these people are married.
Aravosis points up something that struck me as well:
And what about this:
Generally AP uses couples or partners to describe people in civil unions or same-sex marriages.
So clearly AP is admitting that it has a different standard for legally-wed gay couples than it has for legally-wed straight couples. What possible reason does AP have? Marriage is not a federal issue, it’s a state issue – states decide who is married. The feds can say they’re not going to give benefits, but they don’t overrule the state’s marriage – gays are still married in those states, just as straight people arte. Who is AP to say they don’t agree with the states’ legal determination as to who is married?
AP is overruling the 9 states and the District of Columbia that have legal marriages for gay couples. AP says no. They’re not really marriages.
And what about foreign marriages? Same-sex couples can marry in a growing number of countries now. AP has also decided that they’re not really married either.
What business is it of the Associated Press to determine that it doesn’t believe legally wed gay couples, in the US or abroad, are actually legally wed?
OK -- Aravosis gets to be a bit shrill sometimes, but he has a very good point: why the double standard? And as he points out, this comes on the heels of AP banning the use of the word "homophobia" for its reporters.
I've noticed a subtle anti-gay bias in AP stories before this -- as I say, it's subtle, but it's there. What surprises me is that they'd be so blatant about their prejudice, especially considering the general acceptance of gay people in society.
The Associated Press is holding firm against criticism — some of it internal — of a Feb. 11 guidance issued to its reporters and editors that they were to "[g]enerally ... [use] couples or partners to describe people in civil unions or same-sex marriages."
AP spokesman Paul Colford told BuzzFeed Thursday evening, "This week's style guidance reaffirmed AP's existing practice. We've used husband and wife in the past for same-sex married couples and have made clear that reporters can continue to do so going forward."
When covering same-sex couples who have waited decades in some cases for that marriage license, however, the idea that the AP would treat those couples' marriages like civil unions — and not like opposite-sex couples' marriages — has sparked questioning responses from some of AP's own reporters and calls for a change from LGBT organizations and activists.
1. When one of the gay spouses being written about mentions the term husband or wife in a quote, and AP uses the quote. (I.e., The couple could call themselves “blueberries,” and AP would quote it, since publishing a quote doesn’t necessarily mean that AP agrees with, or endorses, the substance of that quote. This is a modified version of the scare-quote defense: “If it’s in quotes, we don’t really mean it.”)
2. AP reporters may use the terms husband and wife if the gay couple “regularly uses” the terms husband or wife about themselves. (And no one has any idea what “regularly uses” means.)
Read Geidner's whole article -- some of the reactions are great. My favorite is from the Fake AP Stylbook (which for some reason I can't copy and embed):
Fake AP Stylebook
@FakeAPStylebook
Avoid using "husband" or "wife" in reference to same-sex married couples; instead use "roommates" or "confirmed co-bachelors."
One of the largest ancient asteroid impact zones on Earth has been discovered in north-eastern South Australia.
The impact zone, which centres on the East Warburton Basin near the Queensland border, was caused by an asteroid up to 20 kilometres-wide that slammed into the planet between 298 and 360 million years ago, report scientists from the Australian National University and University of Queensland.
Terrain around the impact site shows evidence of changes caused by shock-wave related deformation and heating of the ground by an impact event, says study co-author, Dr Andrew Glikson from the Australian National University.
"This shock metamorphic terrain covers an area of over 30,000 square kilometres making it the third-largest site of its kind ever discovered on Earth," says Glikson.
Yeah, so, 300 million years ago and in the middle of nowhere. So what?
"The 280 to 360 million years old impact window places this in the same epoch as the late Devonian mass extinction event".
The late Devonian mass extinction was one of five major extinction events in Earth's history, wiping out large groups of marine species.
"There are indications of mass extinction at this time caused by an impact winter, with the huge flash of the asteroid, major fires and seismic events with magnitudes of 10, 11 and 12, which would have disrupted habitats," says Glikson.
A Richter 12 earthquake? You want to try one of those?
Just when I thought the "family values" contingent couldn't sink any lower, this pops up:
Under your watch, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta has effectively devastated our nation's military by allowing the "gay agenda" to take priority over national defense.
This week, his decision to grant "marriage" benefits to homosexuals in the military presents an unacceptable risk to good order, discipline, morale and unit cohesion - qualities essential for combat readiness.
Most disturbing is his decision to allow homosexual partners to be buried on the hallowed grounds of Arlington National Cemetery.
I urge you to do your part in restoring sanity to the Department of Defense and stop social experimentation in the military.
This is a template for a letter the American "Family" Association (see -- I can use sarcasm quotes, too) is asking their robot army to send to their representatives. If you think it doesn't make any sense, you'd be right. The part that gets me is that extending benefits to the spouses of gay and lesbian service members presents "an unacceptable risk to good order, discipline, morale and unit cohesion." Huh?
And do consider the thrust of the whole thing -- withholding honors from people who in some cases have given their lives in the service of their country because of religious prejudice. Classy.
I almost feel sorry for them -- having to crib from Elaine Donnelley's hymnal like that. Almost.
It’s definitely not “Armageddon.” But an asteroid measuring 150 feet in diameter with a mass of 130,000 metric tons will make the closest pass of Earth for an object of its size on February 15, 2013, traveling about 17,450 miles-per-hour (4.8 miles-per-second), NASA noted on Thursday.
The asteroid’s pass will be a “record predicted close approach for a known object of this size,” said Donald Yeomans, manager of the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Near-Earth Object Programs Office, in a press conference streamed live on NASA’s website on Thursday.
Yeomans said the asteroid, dubbed 2012 DA14, would come anywhere between within 17,100 miles and 17,200 miles of Earth’s surface, well far away enough to avoid any potential collision with our homeworld.
There are video simulations of the fly-by at the link, and also here.
I've seen this a couple of places this morning, and finally stopped to watch the video. It's pretty unbelievable:
Notice how Gretchen Carlson practically has an on-camera orgasm when she says "subsidized with taxpayer dollars." And Shibani Joshi is supposed to be a reporter? Puh-leeze.
Aside from being an idiot, she's either appallingly ill-informed (she must watch Fox News) or an outright liar. Germany has more sun than the U.S.? Excuse me? Lady, have you ever been to Phoenix? Or Los Angeles? Or Miami?
One wonders how much Exxon-Mobil -- excuse me, mean "Fox News" -- is paying her. She gets a Through the Looking Glass award for this one.
Via just about everyone, but especially Digby, who has a great take-down -- with visuals.
If you guessed the one on the left, you'd be right. However, that doesn't seem to make any difference to the Republicans:
Republican aides are calling out the White House for scheduling President Barack Obama's remarks on avoiding the sequester at the same time House Majority Leader Eric Cantor is delivering a major address Tuesday afternoon.
Cantor's address to the American Enterprise Institute at 1 p.m. has been on the books for weeks, and is billed by his aides as an agenda-setting speech — and one, that according to excerpts, will continue the party's shift away from a singular focus on fiscal iss[u]es.
It gets even more surreal:
"Why are they so worried about Americans hearing positive ideas on how to help working families," asked a Cantor aide. "We're flattered they're putting so much emphasis on Leader Cantor's remarks."
Let's see -- so far the Republicans' "positive" ideas on helping working families have included: cutting a million federal jobs; not extending unemployment benefits; tax breaks for the wealthy and corporations; raising taxes on the working poor and what's left of the middle class; cutting government services; nullifying the ACA (as much as they can get away with) by refusing to fund it; cutting the amount of the stimulus; and I'm sure there are others that I've forgotten.
Yeah, I think I'd rather listen to the president talking about how to avoid all that.
(I know -- this stories a couple of days old, but it just leaped out at me.)
From Nan Hunter, an excellent analysis of the "marriage war," with a good point about something I've been saying for a while: the antis are no longer mainstream:
There is another political fracture reflected more subtly in the briefing. The lead lawyers for the parties on the anti-gay side – Charles Cooper for the Prop 8 Proponents and Paul Clement for the House of Representatives – are two of the most skilled and highly regarded appellate attorneys in the country. Their briefs may or may not be persuasive, but they do not lack polish. They sound like what they are: the work product of top-drawer (and top-dollar) law firms.
To see how marginalized the on-the-ground groups trying to block gay marriage have become, you have to peruse the amicus briefs filed by organizations and individuals supporting Cooper and Clement. There are no bar associations, no professional associations, no national civil rights groups, no corporate business voices, and no big prestigious firms that have written the briefs. Some amici are formidable: the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Attorneys General of 17 states, for example. But most of the intellectual, professional and cultural elites have switched sides.
My only objection to Hunter's analysis is that, if you read the briefs filed by Cooper and Clement, yes, they are polished, but the substance is thin -- they don't have much in the way of arguments. (And, as someone noted in the comments, Cooper is arguably incompetent -- I still remember his assertion that he didn't need evidence to support his case -- in a court of law.)
I'm sure you've heard of Tennessee state senator Stacy Campfield, author of the notorious "Don't Say Gay" bill that died in the legislature a couple of years ago. Well, it's back, and it's even worse. He was interviewed by TMZ. Catch this:
I'd read quotes and have heard about the contents of both bills, but you sort of shrug and say to yourself, "OK, it's the reporting -- no one is that stupid and ignorant, not really."
Well, I was wrong. Stacy Campfield is that stupid and ignorant -- and nasty.
on recent same-sex marriage votes? Rhode Island House, 51-19 in favor. House of Commons, 400-175 in favor. Illinois Senate Executive Committee, 9-5 in favor. And in Wyoming, the House committee narrowly defeated a bill, 5-4.
Those of us who, somehow, are still alive. Read this post from Joe.My.God., but brace yourself -- it's devastating. The comments are, many of them, even more so -- so many of us lived that story.
And now the kicker -- what's the music? I know it, I've known it forever, and I can't dig the title out of my head. First right answer gets a round of applause.
ProtectMarriage.com, the advocacy group defending a California gay marriage ban now under review by the high court, showed a $2 million deficit in its legal fund at the end of 2011 - the third year in a row that expenses exceeded donations, federal tax records show.
The 2012 accounts are not yet available. ProtectMarriage.com says it has since covered the 2011 shortfall. However, it is still $700,000 short in fundraising for its Supreme Court costs, according to a ProtectMarriage.com attorney, Andrew Pugno. That message has gone out to donors, with some urgency, as the Supreme Court prepares to hear arguments in March in its first thorough review of same-sex marriage.
"Unless the pace of donations starts to pick up right away, we could soon be forced over a financial cliff," ProtectMarriage.com said in an email to donors earlier this month.
This, coupled with the fact that they were outspent in the 2012 marriage initiatives, and lost all four. My take is that being anti-marriage is becoming toxic, particularly given the viciousness of the rhetoric from the likes of Brian Brown and Tony Perkins. Pugno differs:
Pugno says that fundraising for ProtectMarriage.com has never been easy. However, he said he does not think changing attitudes are the problem.
"I don't detect a decrease in enthusiasm," he said. "What I detect is a certain degree of fatigue after having to essentially fight this issue non-stop since 2004, when the mayor in San Francisco started issuing marriage licenses."
First off, no one asked them to start a fight -- that was their decision. And don't tell me fundraising has never been easy -- that's total bullshit, when you've got the LDS Church and the Knights of Columbus funneling millions into the Prop 8 campaign. My take is that the LDS Church got stung by the blow-back on that one, and isn't quite so willing to fork over for a losing proposition, particularly given the scrutiny it had to endure last time -- they don't like being in the public eye. And the Church has even been supportive of gay-inclusive civil rights laws in Utah.
And if Pugno doesn't think that changing attitudes are the problem, he's been spending too much time looking at his own polls.
A little comparison:
At the close of 2009, ProtectMarriage.com had a deficit of roughly $220,000, but the trial was expensive: Cooper's firm billed $4.5 million in 2010 and total expenses came to $6.1 million, for a year-end deficit of $1.8 million.
ProtectMarriage.com raised $2.5 million in 2011, but it still fell more than $200,000 short of that year's expenses, leaving a cumulative deficit of $2 million. Pugno said that debt was paid by the end of last year and that grassroots donations in 2012 were down only 3 percent from 2011.
By comparison, the American Foundation for Equal Rights - which sponsored Olson and Boies' challenge - reported a $2.7 million surplus at the end of March 2011. AFER outraised ProtectMarriage.com, but the gay rights group also got a much better deal from its lawyers: Olson and Boies' two law firms billed about $1.5 million during the trial year
.
I think that says something about changing attitudes.
Your message did come through -- that's why you lost.
Paul Krugman nails the "Party of Personal Responsibility" to the wall:
The point, I think, is that right-wing intellectuals and politicians live in a bubble in which denunciations of those bums on disability and those greedy children getting free health care are greeted with shouts of approval — but now have to deal with a country where the same remarks come across as greedy and heartless (because they are).
And I don’t think this is a problem that can be solved with a slight change in the rhetoric.
Via Digby, who elaborates from an exchange between Wolf Blitzer and Ron Paul:
“A healthy, 30-year-old young man has a good job, makes a good living, but decides: You know what? I'm not going to spend 200 or 300 dollars a month for health insurance, because I'm healthy; I don't need it,” Blitzer said. “But you know, something terrible happens; all of a sudden, he needs it. Who's going to pay for it, if he goes into a coma, for example? Who pays for that?
“In a society that you accept welfarism and socialism, he expects the government to take care of him,” Paul replied. Blitzer asked what Paul would prefer to having government deal with the sick man.
“What he should do is whatever he wants to do, and assume responsibility for himself,” Paul said. ”My advice to him would have a major medical policy, but not before —"
“But he doesn't have that,” Blitzer said. “He doesn't have it and he's — and he needs — he needs intensive care for six months. Who pays?”
“That's what freedom is all about: taking your own risks.,” Paul said, repeating the standard libertarian view as some in the audience cheered.
“But congressman, are you saying that society should just let him die,” Blitzer asked.
“Yeah,” came the shout from the audience. That affirmative was repeated at least three times.
I'd love to ask Paul my basic question: "Why do people form societies?" But I wonder if he'd even get it.
I've been holding up Iceland (and Germany) as two countries who did it right in handling the economic meltdown of 2008-09. Here's Iceland's president explaining what they did and how it worked:
Our "economic experts" -- at least the ones that get listened to in Washington -- keep recommending the strategies that led to Greece and may cause the Eurozone to collapse.
If it weren't so damned cold and dark for so much of the year, I'd move the Iceland -- it's soon going to be the only place you can get a job, besides China. And I hear jobs in China don't pay so well.
The uses of language have always fascinated me -- the ways in which we use words to shape concepts and discussions of ideas is a key element, I think, in understanding what we're really saying -- or hearing. David Sirota has a great piece at Salon on the way our political discourse has been corrupted by the way in which politicians, pundits, and the media describe agendas and policies.
Yes, indeed, I’m fixated on how this Orwellian scheme by the elite media, politicians, pundits and lobbyists constantly shifts the rhetorical boundaries so that political debates are narrowed to preference outcomes that serve monied interests. Why am I fixated? Because this scheme is as powerful a corrupting force in our politics as campaign contributions, yet unlike bundled checks and anonymous super PAC donations, this scheme goes almost completely unnoticed.
I've been seeing the reports of accidents at gun shows celebrating "Gun Appreciation Day" (although I see that the national campaign got rid of the white supremacist sponsors). Digby has a run-down here, but I have one question: Why in the hell were these guns loaded?
Executives of the Business Roundtable are urging Congress to raise the Social Security and Medicare age eligibility to 70, from the current 67, and to adopt means testing for wealthier retirees, in order to keep the entitlement programs solvent longer-term.
"When you look long-term at the U.S. fiscal health, you have to look at these questions," said Business Roundtable President John Engler during a meeting with reporters in Washington Tuesday.
The idea is not likely to be popular. The Simpson-Bowles deficit reduction committee saw opposition when it suggested lifting the retirement age to 69. The Roundtable executives argue that raising the level gradually for those less than 55 years of age now will provide substantial long-term savings to the entitlement programs, while still giving Americans time to adjust to the new requirements.
"It's the power of compound savings here," said Randall Stephenson, chairman and CEO of AT&T, and vice chair of the group's health and retirement committee. "If you start to save now, it really adds up."
Stephenson's pay last year was roughly $22 million. I can't see him hurting for retirement income.
And this bit really pissed me off:
The CEOs said they are looking at pragmatic options which provide a long-term solution to the unsustainable growth of entitlement spending.
That is pure, unadulterated horse-pucky. First off, Social Security and Medicare are not "entitlements" -- they are earned benefits. They're insurance programs, and I can see where these bozos are trying to model them on private insurance companies, which are possibly the biggest legal racket in the country. (The only thing I can think of that's more blatant is military spending.) It's like the health insurance industry -- you get sick, they cancel your policy.
There are a couple of realistic "fixes" on this. For Social Security, it's probably too simple for the 1% Club to fathom: lift the cap on the payroll tax. Ta-Dah! Solvency for at least the rest of the century, and probably beyond.
And here's my Congresswoman, Jan Schakowsky, with a fix for runaway health-care costs:
The really depressing thing about this is that the parasites from the Business Roundtable will be lobbying Congress, and the members of Congress will listen to them, rather than tossing them out on their asses.
Aaron Swartz was found hanging by a rope Saturday, having committed suicide at the young age of 26. Swartz was brilliant — called a “boy genius” by none other than Lawrence Lessig — and was considered a co-founder of the wildly popular Internet social media sharing website Reddit. He also helped create RSS — which is used by almost every news organization and blog in the world — helped launch Creative Commons, and founded Demand Progress, an organization that rallied over one million people to SOPA and PIPA, the Internet regulation bills that ultimately, fortunately failed.
From all accounts, his death is the result of aggressive prosecution by prosecutor Scott Garland, working under U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz -- in short, he was bullied to death. It looks like another case of someone's political ambitions getting in the way of her reasoning ability.
For what it's worth, here's a petition on the White House "We the People" petition site, calling for Ortiz' dismissal. Let's see if "We the People" have any clout.
It's sort of old news, but I think it's wonderful. Madame Secretary is back at work:
Deputy Secretary of State Thomas Nides handed Clinton a box, saying, "As you know, Washington is a contact sport."
"Inside was a football helmet with a State Department seal, lots of good padding and also a football jersey that said Clinton on the back and on the front it says #112 which symbolizes the number of countries she visited as secretary of state," Nuland said.
"She loved it. She thought it was cool. But then being Hillary Clinton she wanted to get right to business."
Although I have to admit, I'm surprised the right blogosphere isn't having hysterics. I fully expect Daryl Issa (Chairman, House Witch Hunt Committee) to investigate.
Former service members who are part of a class action lawsuit challenging a Defense Department policy that cuts in half the separation pay of those who have been honorably discharged for “homosexuality” will receive their full pay after a settlement announced today.
The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of New Mexico had filed a class action lawsuit against the policy, which was not part of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" statute and so was not changed when that law was repealed.
“There was absolutely no need to subject these service members to a double dose of discrimination by removing them from the armed forces in the first place, and then denying them this small benefit to ease the transition to civilian life,” said Laura Schauer Ives, managing attorney for the ACLU of New Mexico. “This decision represents a long-delayed justice to these veterans.”
The thing about any institution as hydra-headed as the military -- or any other government agency -- is that they'll make sweeping announcements of grand gestures, and the forget about the ancillary stuff.
It's not just that two jaguar cubs were born at the Milwaukee zoo, and not just that their father was captured in the wild (new addition to the captive gene pool, and that's a good thing) -- it's that he's something of a celebrity.
Their father, Pat, was captured in Central America after being deemed a problem jaguar for attacking cattle, so he was a bit of a celebrity at the Belize Zoo before coming to Milwaukee in 2008. The estimated 15-year-old animal also has a book named after him, "Pat the Great Cat: A Jaguars Journey," which was written by children in Milwaukee and Belize as part of a literacy program.
Cardinal George has been a vocal proponent of enforcing Catholic doctrine on the citizens of Illinois, as Neil Steinberg points out in this piece from the Sun-Times:
I should be clear at the get-go, since so many readers have such a hard time with this: I am not Catholic, and my concern is not about what Catholics do or don’t do in practicing their own religion. It’s a free country, sort of, and all may follow whatever faith they like. As the leader of Chicago Catholics, you have a duty to tell your flock what being a good Catholic means. And were that the extent of your letters, I’d never dream of arguing. It would be none of my business.
But that is not what you’re doing. What you’re doing is instructing Catholics to pressure legislators, and pressuring them yourself, joined by like-minded clerics, to craft laws that force non-Catholics to follow Catholic doctrine. That makes it everybody’s business. It is the right — I would say duty — of non-Catholics to resist religious notions being imposed on Illinoisans through law.
Cardinal George is apparently concerned about being known as a bigot, when his attempts to pressure the Illinois legislature spring solely from his Deeply Held Religious Beliefs(TM). (Ahem.) I'm afraid the only response I can come up with to that one is very gay, indeed:
Scientists analysing Australian rocks have discovered traces of bacteria that lived a record-breaking 3.49 billion years ago, a mere billion years after Earth formed.
If the find withstands the scrutiny that inevitably faces claims of fossils this old, it could move scientists one step closer to understanding the first chapters of life on Earth. The discovery could also spur the search for ancient life on other planets.
These traces of bacteria "are the oldest fossils ever described. Those are our oldest ancestors," said Nora Noffke, a biogeochemist at Old Dominion University in Norfolk who was part of the group that made the find and presented it last month at a meeting of the Geological Society of America.
One thing that I find fascinating about this is that the cyanobacteria they're discussing are responsible for the first mass extinction: they're the ones that started pumping oxygen into the atmosphere and killed off all their anaerobic brethren.
But still -- "a mere billion years"? I guess it all depends on your point of view.
