Friends don't ask friends to live with inequality

Yeah, sodomy laws, which ban gay sex, were overturned by the Supremes back in 2003. That doesn't mean states actually took them off their books. For example:

Just this week a gay lawmaker in Montana gave an impassioned plea to eliminate that state's law. He said it made him a felon, even though it hasn't been enforced. The law makes him less than equal. Fortunately, the legislature voted to overturn the outdated law. Alas, 38 GOP lawmakers voted to keep the law.

The story in Virginia is another matter. I think the ACLU sued to have that state's sodomy law removed. A district court did just that. The state's Attorney General (no friend of ours) Ken Cuccinelli asked the Fourth Circuit Court to hear the case. They refused. On to the Supreme Court? Didn't they already rule -- 10 years ago?



Senator Tim Johnson of South Dakota has announced support for marriage equality! That makes 54 out of 100 senators declared for our side. That leaves 3 Democratic senators: Manchin of West Virginia has repeated his opposition, Mark Pryor of Arkansas remains undecided, and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana hiding behind her constituent's disapproval.

Which means the rush to support us will now have a big lull. All the Democrats who are going to have done so and we likely won't see any more GOP senators for quite some time.



Ari Ezra Waldman notes that support for marriage equality stalled for a while back in 2008-2010. What picked up the momentum after that? A string of court cases, including the Calif. marriage case and the several around the Defense of Marriage Act, that showed how empty the reasons against us are. And along with each case was a lot of media coverage, including various discussion shows. So thank the legal system.



Uruguay becomes the 12th country to offer all of its citizens marriage equality! The vote in the House was 71-21.



Contrast that with…

The Oklahoma House brought up a resolution affirming one-man-one-woman marriage. Rep. Kay Floyd walked out of the chamber, wanting nothing to do with the vote, not even wanting to dignify it with a no. Another dozen or so Dem lawmakers followed. The other 15 Dem representatives voted for the measure, which passed 84-0. The bill's sponsor, Bob Cleveland. is mystified why anyone would want to walk out in protest.

The Republican National Committee meets tomorrow. It will vote on a series of resolutions designed to "re-affirm conservative principles" brought by state legislators. One of those will be to affirm one of those principles is marriage is limited to one man and one woman. So much for the national chairman trying to make the party more appealing to minorities. All the comments essentially say, "Go for it! Way to make yourselves irrelevant! And pass the popcorn."



And speaking of the GOP…

Essayist Terrence Heath thinks the GOP would like the Supremes to impose marriage equality across the country for a simple reason: It would make the issue go away, an issue that now gives them only grief. Heath goes on to document the ways that grief will come about and the ways the GOP position is softening. The source of that grief: supporting marriage equality won't draw activist gays away from the Dems but can seriously annoy their own base.

Then Heath goes into ways the GOP is against the country as a whole and, more importantly, against their own youth. Beyond marriage equality that includes issues like a path to citizenship for immigrants, legality of abortion, emphasis on renewable energy and action to slow climate change, tax the wealthy to reduce deficits, avoid cutting Social Security and Medicare, and create jobs.

On to the interesting part. Heath lists the factions of the GOP and notes these factions all hate each other. There is a handy chart (from dailykos) listing the factions and their view of Obama and on some top issues. Here are the categories with the dailykos one word description:

Teabagger: crazy
Paleocon: paranoid
Corporate con: greedy
Neocon: bloodthirsty
Theocon: zealot
Libertarian: me!

Heath asks, how can the various GOP factions reach out to blacks, gays, Latinos, women, and young voters if they can't reach out to each other?



In another essay Heath comments on an interview with Catholic Cardinal Timothy Dolan. Dolan says again that gays can't be married, they can only be friends. Then he says that the Catholic Church hasn't been good at saying they aren't anti-anybody.

Heath isn't buying. He notes the cardinal has said gays should be celibate (as only one of many anti-gay things the Catholic Church -- and Dolan -- has said), then Heath says "Friends, Cardinal, don’t expect friends to live with inequality. Let alone demand it of them."