Three states – Arizona, Florida and California – passed bans for gay marriages. The California ballot initiative that passed faces court challenges base on the California legislature’s lack of approval for a change in the constitution. Historically, the ballot initiative are based on previously referendum, or ballot initiatives to change the tax code – such as Proposition 13 limiting property taxes in the 1979 under Ronald Reagan.
In the 2008 election, the Left Coast, err … I meant to say West Coast voted for Democrat Barack Obama in a landslide, so how did the Proposition 8 pass?
It’s a brain taxing situation for political insiders, handlers and wannabes.
“Yes, We Can, Unless You’re Gay” seems to be the West Coast election mantra.
According to the Washington Post, “Seven in 10 African Americans who went to the polls voted yes on Proposition 8, the ballot measure overruling a state Supreme Court judgment that legalized same-sex marriage and brought 18,000 gay and lesbian couples to Golden State courthouses in the past six months.”
Hispanics voted five in 10 for the ban as well.
Two-thirds of the African Americans polled acknowledged their Christian beliefs influenced their votes.
Yet, the African American population in the United States has the lowest marriage rate in the country along with the highest illegitimate birth rate and highest HIV cases for a racial group in the nation.
Holy Polar-Opposites! “Do as I Say, Not as I Do” revisited.
Not making light of high-profile crimes against minorities, but the dragging and murder of a Texas black man James Byrd happened in the same year as Wyoming gay man Matthew Shepard was tortured and murdered.
Who knows the standards and requirements for minority status with minorities?
Love your brother? I doubt it.
The Blue Dog ponders if our nation’s states had referendums and ballot measures for African Americans to legally vote, lets say 60, 50 or 45 ago, do you honestly believe these social justice measures would have passed?
Doubtful, I say.
With heterosexuals being allowed to marry and divorce multiple time, is there really sanctity of marriage and family when the divorce rate is over 50 percent to begin with?
Who knows in a world of contradictions?
After all, women are not required to be married in order to have babies – just ask a God-fearing grandmother like Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin who is expecting an illegitimate grandchild.
The Hypocrisy of Marriage
In the United States, a person can drink too much and become drunk and then married in the middle of the night in Las Vegas by going to a drive-through chapel with a Nevada Justice of the Peace imitating Elvis Presley and singing “You ain’t nothing but a hound dog …”
In some states, minors as young as 14 can get married with the parent’s permission, but age 16 seems to be the standard in the nation. Paradoxically, a U.S. citizen can’t vote until the age of 18.
Heterosexuals can be married to a first cousin in some states.
Holy Incest!
Heterosexuals can get on a TV show like “The Bachelor” and “The Bachelorette” to sell themselves on national television to find a spouse.
Holy Whore!
Heterosexuals can purchase a spouse – a la mail-order brides – from a Third World country.
Holy QVC!
Sanctimonious marriages, indeed, says the Blue Dog, when
same-sex marriages are legal in countries such as Canada, Norway, South Africa, Spain, and Belgium. Did California’s Mormons fund Proposition 8?
Internet bloggers and rumors are a-buzz stating the LDS Church had a written political draft strategy to defeat same-sex marriages.
A strategy from a church that believes in Celestial Husband, you say?
Yes, indeed. Hmm … I’m guessing that makes Mormon widowers who remarry a Celestial Bigamist in Heaven above.
However, God and history records that Earthly-bound polygamy was revealed as unacceptable to the Prophet only after the halt to the practice was a pre-condition of Utah statehood.
One Nation under God, One Wife under, err … I meant to say for every husband?
Before the Prophet’s edict, Mormon men could marry numerous wives to increase their spiritual concubines increasing their chances for a one-way ticket to Heaven.
Say Amen and pass the cornbread!
More to the point, the appointment of African Americans to full priesthood only followed the Civil Rights Act of 1965 and of course, another Prophet revelation of race equality in the LDS Church.
Darn it! No more rose-colored glasses or lilly-white linens in church!
The Prophet didn’t reveal this fact, but the LDS Church was a major backer with the $36 million raised to pass the gay-marriage ban. Most of the money raised came from outside the state of California.
Blue Dog thought of the day: Should the narcissistic Mormon Church have tax-exempt status when influencing laws in states they are less than 2 percent of the population?
Other Proposition 8 backers, the Catholic Church and Dr. Pat Dobson, could use some IRS scrutiny as well. The Catholic Church and sexual morals are an oxymoron when it comes to pedophile priests along with the Pope’s edicts against divorce and birth control.
Cantankerous-acting Dr. Pat Dobson and his holier-than-thou Christian philosophy are a contradiction in Biblical terms.
Talk about disingenuous Servitude to God. Err … I meant to say the right wing of the National Republican Party.
East vs. West
Let’s revisit the proposition issue because changing the California tax code is a little different than changing the state constitution, which guarantees basic civil rights under the equal protection law.
Over 18,000 gay marriages have been performed since the spring, which brings into play equal rights and protection under current California law. It’s probably going to the U.S. Supreme Court before it’s all said and done.
The lawsuits filed to overturn the law are based on a required two-thirds vote in order for an amendment to be law. The recent 4 percent victory margin for a same-sex marriage ban doesn’t bode well for changes in the state constitution, which affects the gay and lesbian population and their quality of life.
But wait a New York minute. Err … I meant to say an L.A. second, Blue Dog!
Matter of fact, California already allows domestic-partner registration, which is comparable to civil-union laws throughout the nation and provides same-sex couples with state rights and requirements, such as hospital visitation, insurance, inheritance and income taxes.
However, it doesn’t apply to the federal rights of marriage.
In Connecticut starting Wednesday this past week, same-sex marriages were legal. There are no restrictions on being a state resident, so one could expect New York gays and lesbians to take advantage of this.
Not to be outdone, or lose out on the New England vacationing marketing numbers, beginning Jan. 1, 2009, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts will lift resident restrictions on same-sex marriages as well.
Over 10,000 gay marriages have taken place in Massachusetts since 2004 with state residents, and in that time, the sanctity of marriage has not been destroyed.
You know that evangelical hypocritical, but time-honored 50 percent heterosexual missionary position Christian divorce rate? Err … I meant to say sanctity of marriage bond reserved for a man and woman, which was bestowed by God Almighty Himself for a select few church going Evangelical Christians who have never sinned in their entire lives.
Yeah, right.
Tax and Cringe
Over the next four years, I’m positive President Obama will end the U.S. military discriminatory policy “Don’t ask, Don’t tell” as well as support and passage of the Federal ENDA law.
Obama’s administration will probably be the most inclusive in history.
In 1967, 17 states in our nation barred marriages between black and white races. These state elders will have to stand when our mixed-race president walks into a room.
Even though Obama doesn’t politically support gay marriages, I fully expect Obama to circumvent the gay-marriage issue by changing the U.S. tax code for same-sex partners or civil unions to be included in federal marriage tax break.
Obama is smart politically, and I believe he will use California, Massachusetts and Connecticut gay marriages as the probable cause for the changes in the U.S. tax code, which could cost the federal government millions in lawsuits by same-sex plaintiffs.
Other than the evangelicals’ protest against same-sex marriages and the ill-conceived argument were living in a moral cesspool, I believe the No. 1 reason these gay-ban initiatives are passing is that Mainstream America doesn’t want gays to have the same tax breaks.
More to the point, if the federal government takes away the marriage tax code argument, then for all practical purposes the Feds have basically paved the way for gay marriages to be accepted in America.
It’s not a matter of civil rights on the other hand it’s a matter of favored tax standings with American homophobia.
The Blue Dog says Hatred Is Not a Family Value! The Blue Dog says Love Is Not a Crime!
‘Nuff said.
– Column by Steven Sisson
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