Friday, June 12, 2009

WOW....

It seems that with each passing day I become more and more upset/angry with the Presidnet and this Admn. Yes we can..hope...change....well, I dont see any of that now...We must keep pressure up until Obama and the Dems in control of the House and Senate (perhaps we have been letting the congress off the hook to much on this..they could take the lead if Mr. Obama wont) keep the promise they made


Again taken from Andrew Sullivan..

John Aravosis gets ahold of the government's brief in a California DOMA case. He writes:

It reads as if it were written by one of George Bush's top political appointees. I cannot state strongly enough how damaging this brief is to us. Obama didn't just argue a technicality about the case, he argued that DOMA is reasonable. That DOMA is constitutional. That DOMA wasn't motivated by any anti-gay animus. He argued why our Supreme Court victories in Roemer and Lawrence shouldn't be interpreted to give us rights in any other area (which hurts us in countless other cases and battles). He argued that DOMA doesn't discriminate against us because it also discriminates about straight unmarried couples (ignoring the fact that they can get married and we can't).

He actually argued that the courts shouldn't consider Loving v. Virginia, the miscegenation case in which the Supreme Court ruled that it is unconstitutional to ban interracial marriages, when looking at gay civil rights cases. He told the court, in essence, that blacks deserve more civil rights than gays, that our civil rights are not on the same level.

And before Obama claims he didn't have a choice, he had a choice. Bush, Reagan and Clinton all filed briefs in court opposing current federal law as being unconstitutional (we'll be posting more about that later). Obama could have done the same. But instead he chose to defend DOMA, denigrate our civil rights, go back on his promises, and contradict his own statements that DOMA was "abhorrent." Folks, Obama's lawyers are even trying to diminish the impact of Roemer and Lawrence, our only two big Supreme Court victories. Obama is quite literally destroying our civil rights gains with this brief. He's taking us down for his own benefit.

The full brief is below. Make your own mind up. David Link agrees with John:

(1) It is gratuitously insulting to lesbians and gay men, referring (unnecessarily) to same-sex marriage as a “form” of marriage, approving of congressional comparisons between same-sex marriages and loving relationships between siblings, or grandparents and grandchildren, and arguing (with a straight face, I can only assume) that discrimination against same-sex couples is rational because it saves the federal government money. There are some respectable arguments in this motion, and this kind of disrespect is offensive.

The DOJ explains:

As it generally does with existing statutes, the Justice Department is defending the law on the books in court. The president has said he wants to see a legislative repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act because it prevents LGBT couples from being granted equal rights and benefits. However, until Congress passes legislation repealing the law, the administration will continue to defend the statute when it is challenged in the justice system.

When you consider the Berry speech, it is clear that the Obama administration has a gay problem. It is currently an incoherent mess - sending signals on all sides, and doing nothing. Someone needs to be running interference on these matters - coordinating between DOJ and the White House so that this kind of offensive attack on gay equality, which goes beyond pro forma defense, is avoided.

But the best response to this latest disappointment is simply to ask when Obama intends to treat my civil marriage as equal to all the other civil marriages in Massachusetts, as he promised.

When, Mr President and Madam Speaker. When?

2 comments:

  1. Very early in the day I found out about this. Even though I have and still am fighting my "anger" against the current administration specifically when it comes to gay rights issues, today was it for me. It has become increasingly evident that Mr. Obama has decided to step aside from this battle, to the point that we have to hear Dick Cheney speak in favor of gay marriage before Obama utters any word about the subject. Mr. Obama, who made us all think that by supporting him in the past election, we would find a strong supporter in him. So, where are you Mr. Obama? And today, reading the news, even though there may have been some incoordination between the Obama administration and the Department of Justice...just the fact that THERE WAS this incoordination is pretty sad in itself. Why? Because it means that either Mr. Obama does not really care for this issue enough to REALLY pay attention to what is going on with it OR it means that this was purposely done this way. In the end, like it is said up here, this is an incoherent mess. I still keep some hope that it will all be corrected and made right at some point. I hope I am not too optimistic.

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  2. Thanks so much for your comments. I could not have said it any better.

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