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End the Marriage Welfare Penalty

2008-05-13T09:26:00.002-04:00

Senator Sam Brownback and David Blankenhorn of the Institute for American Values jointly penned an op-ed in today's Wall Street Journal, calling for a change in a tax system that, for couples on welfare, according to the article, penalizes poor couples by 10-20% of their total income:

Knowledge of the marriage penalty in poor neighborhoods is typically spread by word of mouth. This informal learning might actually increase the antimarriage impact of the penalty, by convincing nearly all poor couples that they will lose income if they marry, even though some (due to the complexity of the regulations) would not.

In recent years, Congress has made substantial progress in reducing the marriage penalties paid by middle and upper income couples because of the tax system. But lawmakers have done little to address marriage penalties facing the poor through the benefit system.

Why should we care about this issue? For starters, consider the children. A wide range of studies have found that children whose parents are married are significantly less likely to use drugs, have emotional problems, drop out of school, or get into trouble with the law. Studies also consistently find that married adults tend to be happier, healthier and ultimately wealthier than their unmarried but otherwise similarly situated peers.

So when we penalize poor couples for getting married, we are giving them a strong incentive not to take advantage of an institution that would likely help them lift themselves out of poverty over time. Being married gives couples a greater capacity to build assets and economic stability, which could help get them off of welfare for good.

Read it all here.

Ormiston (Rhode Island SS Divorce Plaintiff) Moves to Massachussetts

2008-05-12T13:01:00.003-04:00

Providence Journal, May 9, 2008:

Judge puts off same-sex divorce ruling

PROVIDENCE — A judge yesterday said she needs to know more before deciding whether to ask the state Supreme Court if the Superior Court may grant Rhode Island’s first same-sex divorce.

In December, the Supreme Court ruled that Family Court lacked jurisdiction to grant a divorce to two Providence women — Margaret R. Chambers and Cassandra B. Ormiston — who married in Fall River in 2004, shortly after Massachusetts became the first state to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

Now, Chambers wants the high court to determine whether Superior Court, the state’s main trial court, can dissolve the marriage.

During a hearing yesterday, Superior Court Judge Patricia A. Hurst asked both sides to submit legal memos and she scheduled another hearing for June 12. “You have caught me off guard with a one-page motion with no supporting memoranda, no analysis,” Hurst told Chambers’ lawyer, Louis M. Pulner.

But the judge did make some initial comments about Pulner’s motion, which seeks to certify the jurisdictional question to the Supreme Court.

“Superior Court does not have jurisdiction over divorce proceedings, so the question is whether Superior Court has jurisdiction over proceedings that resolve marital rights without calling it a divorce proceeding,” Hurst said. “Does the court have jurisdiction over two people who want to resolve property interests? That happens every day.”

But Pulner said Chambers and Cassandra B. Ormiston already have a Superior Court case over property interests.

What they want is a divorce and he argued that Superior Court does have jurisdiction to grant them a divorce.

. . .Earlier in the hearing, the judge allowed Providence lawyer Nancy M. Palmisciano to withdraw as Ormiston’s lawyer.

Ormiston then stepped to the podium, representing herself. She told the judge she has moved to Massachusetts, where she will be able to get a divorce after living there for a year. She noted a Fall River lawyer, Julie A. Lynch, had accompanied her to court to underscore her plans to eventually file for divorce in Massachusetts.

“Over the last one-and-a-half years, despite the best efforts on either side, we have had no forum for this divorce to be granted,” Ormiston told the judge. “It’s my understanding Superior Court cases take longer to be scheduled in contested cases, and it leads me to the decision that one-and-a-half years is long enough.”

Hurst told Ormiston, “This is not a forum for you to make statements of this sort. I have no control over you and whether you could or could not move to Massachusetts. I can’t say how that would affect this case. You have a constitutional right to move anywhere you want.”

“But not to be divorced anywhere, your honor,” Ormiston said.

Hurst urged Ormiston to talk to her lawyer about the rules of the court “and how to conduct yourself,” saying, “This is not a forum for communicating information without some context.” For example, it would be appropriate to comment on a pending motion, she said.

After the hearing, Ormiston said she is now living in Attleboro and is planning to rent out her house in Providence. “My spouse, ‘Bobbie’ Chambers, and I have the same goal — to be divorced,” she said. “And I admire Mr. Pulner’s tenacity in trying to get the courts of Rhode Island to provide a forum for the divorce.”

But Ormiston said she doubts the couple will be allowed to divorce in Rhode Island. “When I started out, I was optimistic,” she said. “But now I’d be naïve to believe any court — Family Court, Superior Court or the Supreme Court — will recognize my valid marriage contract” for the purpose of granting a divorce.

Ormiston said her request for a divorce should not be viewed as an exception to a rule. “I am not an exception. I am a citizen who is being discriminated against by the courts,” she said. “A bigamist can get divorced. A criminal can get divorced. But this good citizen — who pays her taxes, votes and is a good neighbor — has no access to justice in the courts of Rhode Island.”

Exposing MA-rital fraud

2008-05-12T01:41:00.002-04:00

By David Benkof
DavidBenkof@aol.com

I do not believe that in our democracy, anything goes. There are certain maneuvers that while legal, are contrary to the spirit of fair play in a democratic republic. Advocates of "marriage equality" have repeatedly shown that they will try any strategy, no matter how sneaky or dishonest, to achieve their goal of redefining marriage.

I'll give just one example. During the campaign for the nation's second-ever statewide non-discrimination law based on sexual orientation, in Massachusetts in 1989, gay and lesbian activists told everyone who asked that the proposed law would never lead to same-sex marriage. In fact, they tried to prove how serious they were by writing into the law the following sentence: "Nothing in this act shall be construed so as to legitimize or validate a ‘homosexual marriage.’" Massachusetts voters and legislators assumed the gay and lesbian community was acting in good faith, and in the interest of fairness, the non-discrimination law passed.

One of the major reasons Massachusetts defenders of traditional marriage gave to oppose a redefinition of marriage in their state is that people in Massachusetts believe homosexuality is immoral. What is the Goodridge v. Massachusetts decision's explanation of why they rejected that reasonable rationale? They offered only a single sentence, which I'm quoting directly from the decision: "Massachusetts has a strong affirmative policy of preventing discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation." That's the only reason the court gave, and the most prominent piece of evidence they cited was the non-discrimination law mentioned above that the voters of Massachusetts were disingenuously told would never lead to same-sex marriage.

Come to think of it, I do not see why the four justices who approved the Goodridge decision should not be arrested and put on trial for violating Massachusetts law, which clearly states "Nothing in this act shall be construed so as to legitimize or validate" same-sex marriage. Judge C.J. Marshall and three other Massachusetts jurists unmistakably construed that very act so as to legitimize and validate same-sex marriage. That was kind of their whole point. Doesn't it undermine our legal system when we fail to punish people who flagrantly violate the law just because they wear robes? I thought the whole point of Watergate was that no one is above the law.

Any fair-minded Massachusetts proponent of same-sex marriage who believes in open democracy should reject the Goodridge decision as fundamentally fraudulent, and advocate for a statewide vote on "marriage equality," or at least a brand-new decision. Any new decision must not use as evidence a law everyone agrees was passed with the assurance that it would never lead to same-sex marriage in order to argue that the people of the Bay State support same-sex marriage. If a court had outlawed same-sex marriage with a similarly outrageous and anti-democratic argument, I would be the first to condemn it as illegitimate. To my knowledge not a single gay or lesbian activist (besides me) has ever expressed a similar opinion about Goodridge. Are "marriage equality" advocates so selfish that they feel winning is more important than playing fair?

The Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) pending before Congress similarly contains a provision supported by Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) which says ENDA won't undermine the male-female federal definition of marriage. Could someone please explain to me why an American citizen who opposes discrimination based on sexual orientation but does not want to see the longstanding definition of marriage change should trust Congressman Frank, who has trumpeted Goodridge, when he says ENDA will not lead to same-sex marriage? If Frank and other marriage equality advocates feel the Massachusetts bait-and-switch was a perfectly acceptable means of achieving their goals (and I see no evidence any of them ever rejected Goodridge), don't people who favor honest lawmaking have no choice but to start rejecting all future measures proposed by such people?

Am I missing something? I really want to know. Anyone who can show me flaws in my logic is invited to send a respectful message to my E-mail address listed above.

Eve Tushnet on Abelard and Heloise's "Tainted Love"

2008-05-11T15:28:00.002-04:00

Yes, I know Eve also posted a link. She just beat me to it:

". . .Heloise is consistent. She is also deeply willful, the least submissive self-proclaimed doormat in human history. Her abnegation is its own form of self-aggrandizement, a serpentine Mobius strip of pride. Even Etienne Gilson, whose sympathy for both lovers comes through on every page of his terrific study Heloise and Abelard, finds himself forced to note, "One hesitates to say this, but the passion for spiritual grandeur which is the secret source of their life story seems never to have been completely pure." Gilson portrays her, believably, as a woman whose thirst for heroism was her tragic flaw. Better to serve Abelard in Hell -- where she can find no reward, and thus face no accusation of self-interest, her heroism shining brightly and alone -- than to serve God in Heaven.

When I first read the Letters, I found it hard to sympathize with the lovers. I was an undergraduate, so I was very hard on Heloise's melodrama -- people enmeshed in melodrama themselves tend to judge other players very harshly. Abelard came across as creepily detached and self-absorbed: She pours out her anguish, he replies with the gas bill and the grocery list.

This time around, I approached them more tenderly. Heloise is shockingly lonely, having followed her love for Abelard -- the one piece of herself she clings to -- into a desolate plain where neither lover nor God can be found. Meanwhile, Abelard fumbles through his responses and attempts to efface himself from their correspondence as completely as possible. He throws himself away with both hands. She never surrenders; he never does anything else. He was prepared to love God by his prior love for Heloise, his superior in so many ways. She had no similar preparation, since idolatry, devotion to what is less than oneself, is the opposite of love of God. . ."

"TAINTED LOVE": Eve's Inside Catholic column

2008-05-11T00:17:00.003-04:00

Hello all--I just realized that my most recent book column for Inside Catholic might be relevant to readers of this site. It's a look at Heloise and Abelard, in that order:

The name of wife may seem more sacred or more binding, but sweeter for me will always be the word mistress, or, if you will permit me, that of concubine or whore.

The Real Meaning of Gay Marriage

2008-05-09T17:11:00.000-04:00

From the Gay Patriot.

Do Kids Make You Happy Part 2

2008-05-09T17:07:00.001-04:00

Arthur C. Brooks in the Weekly Standard:

A new trend among some of the world's most eco-conscious is to forgo children for the sake of the planet. In a recent interview with Britain's Daily Mail, one woman who works for an environmental charity told of aborting her baby because she felt it was "immoral to give birth to a child that . . . would only be a burden to the world." She also had herself permanently sterilized at age 27 for good measure. According to another woman, who works for Ethical Consumer magazine, sterilization was the most ethical decision because " . . . a baby would pollute the planet--and that never having a child was the most environmentally friendly thing I could do."

Whether you view these women as courageous or completely unbalanced, they certainly are self-sacrificing in relinquishing the personal joys of parenthood for the good of the earth, right? Wrong. The truth about children is that they don't make most parents happier, and they don't create a net drain on the world. According to the evidence, forgoing kids is hardly a selfless act.

Read it all here.

Do Kids Make You Happy?

2008-05-09T17:01:00.002-04:00

Harvard psychology professor Daniel Gilbert says no:

Marriage, money and children were conventionally considered to be the cornerstone of happiness but such thinking did not stand up to scientific scrutiny, Harvard University psychology professor Daniel Gilbert told the Happiness and its Causes conference in Sydney today.

According to scientific and economic research, only marriage proved to be a constant source of joy...

...despite the belief that children were the apples of our eyes, they actually had a negative impact on happiness.

The more kids you had, the sadder you were likely to be, Prof Gilbert said.

US and European studies had shown that people's happiness did spike while they were expecting a baby but sharply plummeted after the child was born.

From the AAP. Read the rest here.

Islamic Divorce Ruled Not Valid in Maryland

2008-05-09T16:57:00.000-04:00

The Washington Post reports:

After his wife of more than two decades filed for divorce in Montgomery County Circuit Court, Irfan Aleem responded in writing in 2003, and not just in court.

Aleem went to the Pakistani Embassy in the District, where he executed a written document that asserted he was divorcing Farah Aleem. He performed "talaq," exercising a provision of Islamic religious and Pakistani secular law that allows husbands to divorce their wives by declaring "I divorce thee" three times. In Muslim countries, men have used talaq to leave their wives for centuries.

But they can't use it in Maryland, the state's highest court decided this week.

The state Court of Appeals issued a unanimous 21-page opinion Tuesday declaring that talaq is contrary to Maryland's constitutional provisions providing equal rights to men and women.

"Talaq lacks any significant 'due process' for the wife, its use, moreover, directly deprives the wife of the 'due process' she is entitled to when she initiates divorce litigation in this state. The lack and deprivation of due process is itself contrary to this state's public policy," the court wrote.

Whole story here.

Surrogate mothers fulfilling gay men's parenthood dreams

2008-05-09T16:45:00.000-04:00

From AFP:

An ever-growing number of gay couples are paying tens of thousands of dollars to have surrogate mothers carry their babies, turning America's concept of traditional family on its head.

It took two women and two men for two-year-old twins Katherine and Connor to come to life.

Their fathers, Michael Eidelman and A.J. Vincent, who have lived together for years, invested love, time and all their savings to build their family in New York's Chelsea neighborhood.

The eggs were donated by a woman in Washington state and fertilized in vitro with sperm from both men. The fertilized egg was then inserted in the uterus of a woman from Ohio.

Each man is the biological father of one of the twins, who were born in Los Angeles, where the laws are less stringent for same-sex couples.

More here.

NY High Court Refuses Gay Marriage Case

2008-05-09T16:42:00.002-04:00

The Court of Appeals, the highest court in New York State, Tuesday declined to hear a case challenging an appeals court ruling that found the marriages of same-sex couples married in jurisdictions where they are legal must be recognized in New York.

The decision not to accept the case means the lower court ruling will stand.

On February 1 the Appellate Division of state Supreme Court reversed a judge's ruling in 2006 that Monroe Community College did not have to extend health benefits to an employee's lesbian partner.

Patricia Martinez, a word processing supervisor, sued the school in 2005, arguing that it granted benefits to heterosexual married couples but denied them to Martinez and her partner, Lisa Ann Golden.

From 365Gay.com

Head of "Polyamory" Group Discusses Multiple Partners

2008-05-09T16:21:00.004-04:00

An interesting interview from the Hartford Courant

Most of what we hear about polygamy has to do with stomach-turning situations like the recently raided West Texas ranch where it is believed that members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — a breakaway Mormon sect — abused children.

But Robyn Trask, executive director of Loving More, a Boulder, Colo.-based group, believes it is unfortunate that the public often doesn't hear about what she believes are the positive aspects to having more than one partner.

While polygamy involves having more than one spouse, Trask's group, which has 1,500 active members, including some in Connecticut, supports polyamory: having multiple loves of either sex with or without marriage.

Full story here.

What are Minnesota lesbians afraid of?

2008-05-08T15:15:00.003-04:00

By David Benkof
DavidBenkof@aol.com

I sent the Minnesota gay lobby OutFront Minnesota four reasonable questions about the effects of "marriage equality" on more traditional people, and I was refused because they said ours is an "antigay" blog - which it's not, or I wouldn't be allowed to post here, and there wouldn't be dozens of redefine-marriage posts in our archive. Then I said fine, have my lesbian editor at the Dallas Voice screen the way I use your answers before I post them. Nope. Finally she said she won't answer me and do not contact her again because I'm not "above-board," whatever that means.

It is incredible chutzpah to propose a radical change in society's laws while refusing to answer exactly what that change will entail for people who disagree with you. I think fair-minded people in Minnesota of whatever opinion on marriage should insist that Jo Marsicano tell the truth about what OutFront Minnesota means when it says redefining marriage "would be nothing more than the recognition of reality." Is it nothing more? Is OutFront Minnesota willing to commit to fight any actions that would force those Minnesotans who have what it calls "biased opinions" to espouse the gay community's definition of marriage?

Even if the Minnesota gay lobby is intent on persecuting religious people (which I have no idea if they are), they have a responsibility to speak up now, so Americans of all political affiliations, sexual orientations, and opinions on same-sex marriage will know exactly what they're up to.

You can contact Jo Marsicano at:

Jo Marsicano
Communications Director
OutFront Minnesota
(phone) 612-822-0127 ext. 106
jmarsicano@outfront.org

If she changes her mind and comes clean on what her group is planning, I promise to report back here on the blog.

UPDATE; I just got an E-mail from a MarriageDebate.com reader named Danny. He said when he called Jo Marsicano she said that OutFront Minnesota doesn't answer "right-wing questions." I looked at her Web site and it says OutFront Minnesota is a "non-partisan organization." I wonder what the Minnesota Log Cabin Republicans and other "right-wing" donors, members, and supporters of her group would feel about her refusing to answer an openly LGBT Republican's questions because he's not sufficiently liberal for her. I also wonder how she thinks she's going to get legislation passed in a state with a Republican governor if she opposes right-wing questions.

Family Issues are Fiscal Issues

2008-05-07T19:30:00.002-04:00

Ever since I wrote Love and Economics, I have been trying to explain to economists, libertarians and fiscal conservatives that the family is a fiscal issue. Now, the Institute for American Values comes along and documents this point by point, state by state. Here are a few highlights.

family fragmentation costs U.S. taxpayers at least $112 billion each and every year, or more than $1 trillion each decade.

Me: This is the equivalent of the entire Gross Domestic Product of New Zealand.

Of these taxpayer costs, $70.1 billion are at the federal level, $33.3 billion are at the state level, and $8.5 billion are at the local level. Taxpayers in
California incur the highest state and local costs at $4.8 billion.

Me: CA now faces a state budget deficit of around $12 billion. This means that family fragmentation accounts for over a third of CA's deficit.
Just today, the San Diego Union Tribune published a story
here on education budget cuts in California. Way down in the bottom of the story is magnitude of the overall expected reduction:

Statewide, 14,000 teachers received pink slips in response to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's proposed $4.4 billion reduction in education spending.

Very nearly the amount that IAV estimates as the cost of family fragmentation. Read it and weep.
By the way, Love and Economics is up on Amazon. Both editions: the Collegiate Edition and the Streetfighter Edition.
Cross posted at my personal blog.

Marriage equality for incest-lite?

2008-05-07T03:21:00.005-04:00

By David Benkof
DavidBenkof@aol.com

The people who want to redefine marriage insist they share our values and aren't trying to change the nature of what marriage means in America. So it is clearly fair game to look carefully at the full range of how gay and lesbian relationships over the last decade or more have worked.

Though most straight people have never heard of it, there's a small but not insignificant subculture among gay and bisexual men known as the "Daddy-boy" scene. (Google it for some examples.) These are typically two adult men with a large age difference - which is the erotic point of the relationship. The older man is referred to as "Daddy" by his "boy," sometimes called his "son." While virtually none of these men desires an actual incestuous liaison, gay "sexperts" acknowledge that some of the excitement of these relationships comes from role-playing incest fantasies.

I am certainly not suggesting this behavior should be illegal - any more than that of two consenting adults who act out a child molestation "scene." But this form of relationship has no clear counterpart among couples married using the longstanding definition of the word. To my knowledge, there has never been an adult age-diverse "Mommy-boy" couple looking for applause as they march in a mostly straight parade. But the equivalent absolutely happens in the gay community by members of the Daddy-boy subculture.

Daddy-boy couples are not stigmatized at all by the gay community, or criticized in editorials in the gay press. It represents an unusual (though not the most unusual) but completely accepted way for two gay men who love each other to arrange their relationship.

Now, we're constantly told that adding same-sex couples to the marriage rolls will make very little difference in what marriage means and won't harm any presently married couple. But I think starting to call couples who model their love after incestuous realtionships "married" would would do incredible damage to the institution.

I know many decent, basically moral people who disagree with me on same-sex marriage. I would invite them to show good faith in their claim that same-sex marriage won't change the basic nature of what marriage means by agreeing that if and when the definition of marriage ever changes, they will work with me to make sure couples who base their relationship dynamic on incest will not be included.

To be clear: I am not saying that "Daddy-boy couples" are a legitimate reason to deny people in more conventional same-sex relationships inclusion in some future definition of marriage. I am saying, however, that because everyone can agree that the subset of the gay community that eroticizes incest would materially hurt the hallowed institution of marriage, we should all make sure that if a redefinition of marriage does occur, it won't include this legal but troubling way of letting people experience the taboo thrill of incest without actually doing it.

How SSM leads to "special rights"

2008-05-05T09:48:00.005-04:00

I've been corresponding with some people who complained to me that people like myself who want to keep the present definition of marriage are abridging their rights. I've been responding that same-sex marriage advocates are actually the ones limiting people's rights. In Boston, if your church has a deeply held moral belief that children need both a mother and a father, and you want to help parents adopt, you are required to either violate your principles or to stop helping children find loving families. That's what gay "marriage" has wrought in the first state to fall victim to tyrannical judges and selfish gay activists. Virtually everyone agrees that the real victims of the shut-down of the highly praised Catholic adoption service in Boston are poor orphans of color. But as far as I can gather from the gay press and the Web, the gay community literally doesn't care. Being treated as "equal" appears far more important to them than the welfare of abandoned children.

If LGBT people want to help gay parents adopt, I'm all for it. Let them set up their own adoption agencies and match kids to parents based on their value system. They could even reject Ozzie and Harriet for all I care. Each group should be allowed to behave consistently with its values as long as they're not hurting anybody. But no - the gay advocates convinced the government to demand that Catholics either embrace gay and lesbian values they think are wrong, or face civil and criminal penalties if they employ Catholic values in their important, heroic work.

And gays tend to squeal when people say they want "special rights." But they do. What's more special than being able to arrange for a child's adoption based on your value system - one that happens to be at most one or two generations old, whereas the Catholic Church with its centuries of tradition is forced to violate its principles if it wants to rescue abandoned children. Sounds pretty special to me.

It's, um, about democracy, stupid

2008-05-05T01:33:00.005-04:00

By David Benkof
DavidBenkof@aol.com

I've been having an interesting conversation at the Independent Gay Forum with some advocates of changing the definition of marriage. It quickly became apparent that what they want is to be the only people whose opinions count in deciding the definition of marriage. At first they alleged that I was trying to force them to adopt my beliefs that the Torah comes from G-d and gay sex is immoral and marriage is by definition a man-woman institution. But I explained that they could have any beliefs they wanted, but what I was looking for was simply the ability to express and defend my beliefs and advocate for public policies in line with those beliefs.

Here are some of the things people said:

"I am however human and don’t appreciate the arrogance of people that use those same stories and other texts in the Torah and Bible to oppress me because I am gay. Use the teachings in your own life but don’t insinuate them into mine."

"I have a problem when anyone wants to impose this personal belief on others. So if you don't believe that you should marry a man, or not even have a romantic relationship with a man any more, I fully respect that right. I have trouble understanding why you believe that this belief must be dictated to others."

"You may or may not be right regarding same sex marriage. However, using justification from a source thousands of years ago, doesn't and shouldn't fly."

I can think of no way to interpret these statements, which are consistent with other things same-sex marriage advocates have said, other than that only pro-same-sex-marriage voices should be heard and counted in this debate. If my religion teaches me that it is unacceptable for a society to allow two men of any religion to try to marry (which it does), the first speaker apparently believes I must not speak out or vote based on my deeply held beliefs, because that would be "insinuating them" into his life.

The second speaker objects to my "dictating" my belief that same-sex marriage is wrong to others. And if the speaker is a libertarian and won't dictate his beliefs about whether it's OK to own guns or use heroin or ride a motorcycle without a helmet, then I can have a modicum of respect for him (although I'll bet he does try to dictate his beliefs about at least one of those three subjects). But even so, I'm not a libertarian. I believe it is not only legitimate but vital to work for a society that maintains a man-woman definition of marriage. So why can't I speak out about it and lobby and vote based on my beliefs? Are his beliefs the only ones that should be taken into consideration by the society? Does he think this is Stalinist Russia?

Then there's the third speaker, who believes he has the right to decide what kinds of justification a person can legitimately use to defend his political beliefs, and what kinds are illegitimate. Let's leave aside the fact that many causes the third speaker probably believes in, such as abolition of slavery, conscientious objection to the Vietnam War, and the civil rights movement were led by people motivated by religious beliefs based on sources from thousands of years ago. This person appears to believe that one can pick a political position based on a Michael Moore movie, or a Doonesbury comic strip, or a Jon Stewart fake news clip, or a Maureen Dowd column. And those people should speak out and lobby and vote based on what they learned in that movie or strip or news clip or column. But people whose beliefs are based on the Torah, for example, should step out of the way and vote against their conscience because speaker #3 feels that particular justification "shouldn't fly."

There's a pattern here. Same-sex marriage advocates for the most part act like they don't really believe in democracy. They believe in getting their way by any means necessary, including demanding that people who disagree with them shut up. In Massachusetts, these non-democratic Democrats and gay advocates used all kinds of sneaky maneuvers to prevent a statewide vote on the definition of marriage - because they knew they would lose.

The "redefine marriage" crowd kept saying, "Don't put my rights to a vote!" Given that gays in Massachusetts have always had the equal right to marry (under the pre-2004 definition), but did not have the right to redefine marriage until the state Supreme Court did it for them in Goodridge, what they were really saying is "The votes of the people are irrelevant to my basic right to redefine marriage in a way consistent with my minority viewpoint on what marriage is." Well, If that's true, shouldn't I have the right to re-redefine marriage in a way consistent with my majority viewpoint on what marriage is?

I would have a lot of respect for a gay activist who said, "Let's debate the definition of marriage openly and fairly. I believe that the more we talk about it, the more people will agree with my opinion that we need a more flexible definition of marriage. And then, let's have a statewide vote next year and let the people decide."

Then, if in my state the people voted for a new definition of marriage, I would immediately redirect my energies into seeing that unlike in Massachusetts, my state would never force someone who prefers the "old" definition of marriage to behave as if he accepted the government's new definition. But if the election was fair, I would feel I had to live with the will of the voters.

But that's not what's been happening, and in a democratic nation, it's frankly outrageous.

New Study: Single Mothers and Air Pollution

2008-05-02T22:50:00.001-04:00

Two researchers in Social Science Quarterly conclude we need to move beyond race and income and include more family structure variables: in studies of whose at risk for environmental toxins, here.

Baby Snatching by Arlington County (VA.)

2008-05-01T22:30:00.001-04:00

Editorial
Baby snatching by Arlington County
The Washington DC Examiner Newspaper
2008-04-18 07:00:00.0

WASHINGTON -
There’s an empty highchair sitting in the kitchen of the Arlington home of Nancy Hey and Christopher Slitor. It’s their daughter Sabrina’s highchair. But it’s been empty for two years because thieves disguised as Arlington County social workers and judges took her from her parents. She was stolen with no public scrutiny or accountability. Arlington County social workers used unproven allegations of neglect in April 2005 to justify removing then-3-week-old Sabrina from her parent’s home. Her parents were accused - anonymously - of starving Sabrina. And they were deemed unable to care properly for their daughter, even with the frequent help of Nancy Hey’s mother and a full-time nanny. After more than two years of legal wrangling with the county’s Child Protective Services (CPS), Arlington Circuit Court Judge James Almand terminated the couple’s parental rights in June 2007.

But nine months earlier, Sabrina’s parents were completely exonerated by Virginia CPS hearing officer George Walton, who noted in his official report that, despite the baby’s worrisome 10-ounce weight loss soon after her birth by Caesarian section, nothing in the her medical record indicated she had ever been in danger. There was also no evidence, Walton added, that Sabrina’s “failure to thrive” resulted from parental neglect.

In fact, the record showed the opposite: Nancy Hey – who suffers from a developmental disorder that makes it difficult for her to recognize non-verbal signals from others – and her husband fully cooperated with medical professionals and CPS workers throughout their ordeal. In any case, Sabrina was at her proper weight when she was taken away by county officials, two days after her parents told social worker Dana Zemke that they were retaining a lawyer. Arlington Judge Esther Wiggins Lyles signed the removal order with neither Hey nor Slitor even aware of the proceedings, much less being present to contest the decision. Sabrina went to a politically influential local professional couple with no training as foster parents, despite CPS requirements that foster couples be trained before being entrusted with children.

Judge Almand later used the baby’s inappropriate removal to justify making the separation permanent, saying it would be too “traumatic” to return Sabrina to her natural parents. So, when Sabrina turned 3 April 3rd, she didn’t blow out her birthday candles in the kitchen where her heart-broken parents still keep her empty highchair. Even after spending $350,000 in legal fees, they have not given up hope. They’ve asked the Virginia Court of Appeals to return their child. Meanwhile, every Arlington County employee involved should be put under oath and questioned in public about their role in this outrage."

Australia to cut gay discrimination

2008-05-01T20:59:00.001-04:00

From the Washington Post.

Presbyterian Church Clears Minister In Gay Marriage Case

2008-05-01T20:55:00.001-04:00

From the San Francisco Chronicle:

A San Rafael minister who presided over several same-sex ceremonies didn't violate Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) rules, because same-sex marriages don't exist in the church, a church court ruled Tuesday.

At the same time, the Permanent Judicial Council's ruling affirmed the right of same-sex couples to have unions, a ceremony that would theoretically have a distinct liturgy.

The ambivalent ruling - affirming the rights of gays and lesbians to have their relationships sanctioned by the church but not considering them equal to those of heterosexual couples - is likely to disappoint both sides in the debate.

Whole story here.

Same-sex divorce case takes a new turn

2008-05-01T20:53:00.000-04:00

From the Providence Journal.

Kasier Poll: 7 percent of Americans Know Someone who Married for Health Insurance

2008-05-01T16:33:00.001-04:00

A Kaiser poll finds 7 percent of Americans claim to know someone who married mainly for access to health insurance, survey here.

Hunter College Poll of Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Americans

2008-05-01T14:42:00.003-04:00

A nationally representative poll (using Knowledge Networks internet panel data) of gays, lesbians and bisexuals has been released by Hunter College, paid for by HRC.

Lots of interesting stuff: 2.9 percent of Americans are GLB, about half are gay or lesbian. People who identify as exclusively gay or lesbian are two-thirds male. People who identify as bisexual are two-thirds female.

Same-sex marriage did not make the list of the top 5 political priorities of GLBs overall. It skyrockets, however, among 18-25 year olds.

Data, here (and thanks to Gary Gates for passing this along).

Latest California SSM Poll

2008-05-01T12:10:00.002-04:00

Less than a third of Californian support SSM when civil unions are offered as an option. Minority opposition remains stronger than whtie opposition. Since California law already offers civil unions, it will be interesting to see how this effects the vote on the California marriage amendment, which backers (Including NOMCalifornia.org, my organization) say they have collected enough signature to put on the ballot, results here.