Bailing out of a sinking ship

One of many reasons for not posting much lately: mice in the kitchen. One has been removed (unharmed to the golf course next door), but there is evidence of more. Holes between the basement and outside have been plugged.

Back before the Calif. gay marriage ban trial began there was an argument about broadcasting the trial or posting summaries on YouTube. The pro-gay side thought it was a marvelous idea. The anti-gay side said it would scare off their witnesses. That little tiff went before the federal Supremes and they decided broadcast wasn't a good idea. Two reasons were given. The first is that the district court where the trial is being held didn't go through the right procedures in permitting the broadcast. The second is that five justice bought into the issue of irreparable harm. Sotomayor strongly disagreed. What harm? Never mind irreparable. These were the people who were out front during the original campaign for the ban.

So the trial won't be broadcast. Funny thing -- anti-gay expert witnesses are bailing out anyway. Perhaps they are seeing how pro-gay witnesses are chewing through their arguments and don't want to sit through a cross-examination. It is one thing to whip up the anger of the masses, quite another to face down a skeptical prosecutor and judge.

Here's summary of each day's arguments (there is one more day to go on the pro-gay side) with postings of background commentary.

Ted Olson, the guy who represented Bush in the 2000 case Bush v. Gore, is one of the two lead lawyers arguing to end the Calif. gay marriage ban. He has an article in Newsweek about the conservative case for gay marriage. It's well worth reading. I note that the conservative case sounds a lot like the liberal case. There is also an introduction to the piece by Newsweek authors.

Here is an easily understood explanation of what a court does in determining if a law is discriminatory.