With another prop8-like challenge coming up in November, I think in Maine this time, Im now convinced same sex marriage supporters are just treading water and not getting much anywhere.
In iOwa its great they have same sex marriage, but as soon as
some republican gets back in, or as soon as they put the issue on the ballot, same sex marriage laws will be their short lived victory, as with California.
Anti-Gay groups will soon start pumping in money, whatever it takes, to spread lies and create fear, in iOwa too.
So I ask? do supporters really have to constantly go thru this over and over, state by state, time and time again?
And in iOwa, while current law allows many couples to marry, nothing on a daily
basis has really changed as far as I can tell. By not yet having federal recognition, state recognition seems a bit... pointless. I now realize it is not the state that matters with this, it is the federal.
Just as with 1960?s civil rights, and LBJ, same sex couples need to focus on the federal level, and forget about the state level. Their money needs to go towards lobbying on the federal level, members of congress, and not wasted on the state level.
When success is experienced on the federal level, then the state level will become moot, as it should be.
Federal recognition would, as I understand it, give same sex marriage rights
in all states, coast to coast. Thus ending the practice of slapping anti-marriage challenges onto state ballots every election cycle. Once the federal government
recognizes same sex couples, then the battle will have been won once and for all.
On the state level, same sex marriage laws prove to be just too vulnerable.
All it takes is for one opposed group, plus their money, and a barrage of TV spots, to turn the tide.
This is just wrong. Im my opinion, it goes against the freedom and liberties granted in the US constitution. It boarders on mob rule, and third world politics.
"Civil rights" should never become some ballot issue, period.
If LBJ had gone that route, and had not pushed for federal civil rights for blacks,
then every southern state one by one could in fact overturn civil rights laws and return states back to the days when women and blacks were not allowed to vote.
Can you imagine?
With the climate of current by some, since Obama was elected, would anyone
be that surprised if some southern states actually put civil rights on the ballot for voter
approval, or rejection? Trying to stop another Obama from happening?
And what then after even one such ballot initiative won?
Federal protection of civil rights, signed into law by LBJ, grants blacks their due protections. Gay men and women need to fight for the same federal protection as to marriage.
Fighting for rights on a state by state level will, in the end, get them nowhere.
They will be forever looking behind their shoulder, every election cycle,
to see from which group the next challenge will come from.
I very much agree with Barney Frank, in that they should be pounding the halls
of congress, and not pounding the streets, in protest.
And too, by not wasting the money fighting on the state level.
They will forever be much too vulnerable, and that vulnerability needs to be removed.
In iOwa its great they have same sex marriage, but as soon as
some republican gets back in, or as soon as they put the issue on the ballot, same sex marriage laws will be their short lived victory, as with California.
Anti-Gay groups will soon start pumping in money, whatever it takes, to spread lies and create fear, in iOwa too.
So I ask? do supporters really have to constantly go thru this over and over, state by state, time and time again?
And in iOwa, while current law allows many couples to marry, nothing on a daily
basis has really changed as far as I can tell. By not yet having federal recognition, state recognition seems a bit... pointless. I now realize it is not the state that matters with this, it is the federal.
Just as with 1960?s civil rights, and LBJ, same sex couples need to focus on the federal level, and forget about the state level. Their money needs to go towards lobbying on the federal level, members of congress, and not wasted on the state level.
When success is experienced on the federal level, then the state level will become moot, as it should be.
Federal recognition would, as I understand it, give same sex marriage rights
in all states, coast to coast. Thus ending the practice of slapping anti-marriage challenges onto state ballots every election cycle. Once the federal government
recognizes same sex couples, then the battle will have been won once and for all.
On the state level, same sex marriage laws prove to be just too vulnerable.
All it takes is for one opposed group, plus their money, and a barrage of TV spots, to turn the tide.
This is just wrong. Im my opinion, it goes against the freedom and liberties granted in the US constitution. It boarders on mob rule, and third world politics.
"Civil rights" should never become some ballot issue, period.
If LBJ had gone that route, and had not pushed for federal civil rights for blacks,
then every southern state one by one could in fact overturn civil rights laws and return states back to the days when women and blacks were not allowed to vote.
Can you imagine?
With the climate of current by some, since Obama was elected, would anyone
be that surprised if some southern states actually put civil rights on the ballot for voter
approval, or rejection? Trying to stop another Obama from happening?
And what then after even one such ballot initiative won?
Federal protection of civil rights, signed into law by LBJ, grants blacks their due protections. Gay men and women need to fight for the same federal protection as to marriage.
Fighting for rights on a state by state level will, in the end, get them nowhere.
They will be forever looking behind their shoulder, every election cycle,
to see from which group the next challenge will come from.
I very much agree with Barney Frank, in that they should be pounding the halls
of congress, and not pounding the streets, in protest.
And too, by not wasting the money fighting on the state level.
They will forever be much too vulnerable, and that vulnerability needs to be removed.