Via our AP wire:
Washington state voters have approved the state’s new “everything but marriage” law, marking a significant expansion of rights for gay couples who are registered as domestic partners.
National gay-rights groups say the passage of Referendum 71 marks the first time a state’s voters have approved a gay equality measure at the ballot box.
Read the full story, over here.
November 6th, 2009 at 9:43 AM
Haven’t seen Bikerbob lately!
http://www.southparkstudios.com/episodes/251889
AFY!!thesheepdog!!!
November 6th, 2009 at 10:04 AM
This has been too long in coming, but at least a little over half of the people are not insanely misinformed and bigoted. There are many ways in which religion poisons every aspect of our lives, but at least in this case it is clear that many who consider themselves religious do not buy the hysteria of the far right evangelical movement and recognize this is one of the last big areas of public life where our country needs to be brought into the 21st century and gain some perspective as well as compassion while ending the abuse of civil rights that homophobia engenders. It’s a start, but time will tell. In the popular entertainment media even those who are gay friendly resort to the childish characterizations of gays that still permeates our society like a virus. We have learned not to tell and laugh at the ignorant who make jokes of minorities that are mean and hurtful, it’s time to stop laughing at gay jopkes that are meant to demean and slander.
November 6th, 2009 at 10:11 AM
So will future petitioner’s names be kept secret?
Maybe that would mean new life for Eyman,
whose name on a referendum seems to be an automatic losing strategy all by itself.
Imagine a planet where Tim could operate behind the scenes in total secrecy,
sanctioned by Scalia himself!
November 6th, 2009 at 10:19 AM
Jurgen, my compliments on a very thoughtful, meaningful comment!
November 6th, 2009 at 10:46 AM
I had another, but either my computer or Sam disapproved, so I’ll add a thought again as all politics is interwoven these days. The health care bill is about the least the Democrats could have done to right the situation of millions living in despair because of the lack of basic health care and therefore the ability to live a more normal life for some period of time. The insurance companies only look at the bottom line and speaking of lining things–they too have lined their pockets with big Pharma and corporate world control masters disguised as leaders. We citizens seem to have forgotten that these are our children and the children of friends and fellow citizens we are talking about. Not numbers, not units, not just hospital bracelets. Maybe it’s just me and a few million of my compatriots, but I’m more worried that some being is going to suffer, irregardless of his or her station in life or contribution, rather than if I or my fellow citizens who live privileged lives as if they were owe us is going to be able to buy that new flat screen TV this year or send more money out of the country buying Chinese and not made in America goods.
A global economy is nice for those who are doing well but….all this success and stature as a nation is meaningless and downright evilly twisted if others suffer at the expense of those who can never get enough. The people who are truly being asked to step up and pay a bigger share of their wealth to make us all mensches rather than miscreants can postpone that golf trip or that new car a few weeks and the average guy can give up that upgrade to blu-ray for a while so that when he drives down the street he doesn’t see people being forced and even encouraged to live like animals. Free Market is fine, but as capitalism is perverted and practiced now, it only breeds psychoses. The every man and woman for themselves spirit has got to mature and be replaced. Capitalism relies on the constant supply of desperate labor and desperation is why we are so grumpy, overbearing and pushy on personal and grand scale alike. IMHO
November 6th, 2009 at 10:47 AM
Damn I really wanted no typos in that one, oh well you get the gist.
November 6th, 2009 at 11:05 AM
Jurgen,
Your post reminded me of an interesting documentary by the award winning Australian journalist, John Pilger, provocatively entitled “The New Rulers of the World.” The film is about the impacts of globalization on Indonesia and highlights working conditions in the economic zones there. It can viewed online right here:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7932485454526581006&ei=CVv0Sq3PKIG4qAOg4vXmCA&q=%22john+pilger%22&hl=en#
November 6th, 2009 at 11:06 AM
Jurgen - I see no record in the spam filter of a previous post from you, so I think it’s probably on your end.
November 6th, 2009 at 11:08 AM
There will always be those who would rather get in line for a handout than go out in life and earn it! There will always be those who believe they are owe everything the require because they exist and then there will be those who exist to earn everything they require!
Finally, the increasingly powerful culture of entitlement and rights further undermines the value of earning anything. The more the state gives to its citizens, the less they have to earn. That is the basic concept of the welfare state — you receive almost everything you need without having to earn any of it. About half of Americans now pay no federal income tax — but they receive all government benefits just as if they had paid for, i.e., earned, them.
America became a great civilization thanks to a culture based on the value of having to earn almost everything an American got in life. As it abandons this value, it will become a mediocre civilization. And eventually it will not be America. It will be a large Sweden, and just as influential as the smaller one.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/04/21/the_more_given_the_less_earned_96085.html
AFY!!thesheepdog!!!
November 6th, 2009 at 11:17 AM
Jurgen,
I think it’s noble that you are so thoughtful about your fellow human being. The problem as I see it is that instead of calling on people to take action and right these injustices you suggest that the government should be doing this and everyone should be content to just pay for it.
What about calling on people to stand up and help their fellow man, their neighbor, the poor and elderly in their community?
Instead we end up with this culture of seeing those in need on the streets and wondering “why isn’t the government helping them?”
It’s about individual responsibility, the government can’t replace that or force that.
November 6th, 2009 at 11:17 AM
I assume when you say “There will always be those who would rather get in line for a handout ” you must be referring to the health insurance companies who do feel like they’re earned entitlements after the huge sums they have stashed into our politician pockets.
Right on, AFY???
November 6th, 2009 at 11:19 AM
Thanks, Jurgen.
Today is Health Care Reform Day over on Latte Republic. I have reviewed the committee sites and have posted information that I think might be of interest to commenters who are searching for factual information, rather than Luanne Vanwerven’s opinion!
Click the title of the article and you will be taken directly to the Committee page where there is enough reading material to last an entire week.
The MIT cost analysis and the CBO’s revised analysis are fascinating if you are interested in learning more about financing proposals.
What’s the cost of doing nothing? The Federal Government goes broke! (That’s us).
November 6th, 2009 at 11:34 AM
Yeah the big insurance companies have been entitled by big government and the solution ain’t more big government entiltlement!
Both big insurance and big government are the problems not the solutions!!!
And we all knows Madam E is always interested in both sides, don’t we! Freedom of debate is a ok for some as long as the debate is limited to what they say, don’t you know!
“And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed—if all records told the same tale—then the lie passed into history and became truth. ‘Who controls the past’ ran the Party slogan, ‘controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.’”
- George Orwell, 1984, Book 1, Chapter 3
AFY!!thesheepdog!!!
November 6th, 2009 at 12:00 PM
Ya, I distinctly remember Reagan promising to “get the government off our backs” with smaller government. He repeatedly said, “government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem!”
He also promised to slash our taxes. Remember George H. W. Bush, “Read my lips!?”
All of turned out to be a duplicitous ruse.
November 6th, 2009 at 12:32 PM
Right agin Mr Todd2, both parties are guilty of spending and the national debt! There has been progressives in both parties! Though it should be noted that Reagan had a lot different makeup in congress than GWB.
Reducing spending is the only way to control our debt and I would follow anyone from either party today that believed in that and actually did it.
The Trillion of dollars of debt will destroy this country, and spending has to be controlled or else!
Which also means government can not do everything for everyone!
AFY!!thesheepdog!!!
November 6th, 2009 at 12:34 PM
Back to the issue of the post, Ref. 71, this was a wonderful blessing that this passed. So many of my friends would have been personally affected and to see that Washington, for the first time in the history of our nation, voted to APPROVE civil rights proves once again . . . we are smarter than California.
November 6th, 2009 at 12:58 PM
Hammer, we are the government–you and I and the guy next door. The reasons some aren’t able to play to the level of self reliance that you would impose are myriad and far more complicated than the emotional bell ringing obfuscations and oversimplifications springing from the fertilized minds and mouths of the likes of Limbaugh or the Fox channel. People who listen to that drivel are inviting ignorance into their lives. Capitalism is all about building wealth on the backs of the poor. Capitalism does not work without an under class to scare the masses into line. As Capitalism is practiced in this country it does not have heart. That is the difference, we are humans and many of us worship more than the fantasy of obtaining wealth. All that aside we should be able to take care of the basic needs of those who struggle for any of the many reasons that afflict society, from drugs to crime. Without hope, all you’ve got is drugs and crime.
Riley, kudos and I apologize for getting so off topic, but really we’re not. The same sort of spirit of delusion that permeates all of our systems is why we have not gotten to the stage of personal growth to recognize and accept different sexual orientations for the natural selection the are. We always stop short for the easy angry response to differences we can’t grasp.
As I recently traveled to the beautiful country of New Zealand, I was struck by just how good of a mood everyone was in. There was no road rage, no honking if you impede someones line of travel for a millisecond. I asked a teenager for directions on the street and instead of grunts I got not only a cogent direction in actual english but a wish for me to have a great time in the country. People actually carry guns but only during hunting season, only rifles and only to and from the hunt. They don’t use sport as an excuse to go armed and entertain fantasies of eventually putting some imagined enemy six feet under. And they are gay friendly if not exceedingly tolerant. By comparison, we’re grumpy, and mad as hell and don’t want to take it anymore; but we are too comfortable to actually go after the fat cats who lord it over us because hey, we could be a fat cat someday. What nonsense upon which to base decisions.
November 6th, 2009 at 1:48 PM
I definitely need to clarify my last comment. I hope you don’t think I was talking about the individual responsibility of the poor or the elderly. I understand and have seen firsthand how unforseen circumstances or events can ruin peoples lives. I was talking about the individual responsibilty of the rest of us who make up the real safety net of America. I believe that we all have a moral obligation to care for others, but at the same time that obligation can’t be forced out of us it has to be a choice.
November 6th, 2009 at 2:35 PM
Something always has to force it. That’s why so many seniors who need their keys taken away , still have them. Everyone’s afraid to state their judgment except at voting time and then they vote emotionally to cut their own throats and keep us stuck in second gear.
With an elderly parent it has to be a firm talk, some time, but some pressure too.
Hammer you have hit the problem at the central core of most other problems like a 24 ounce framing hammer on the head of a nail ……The collective body of us, as represented by our government, has to mandate the rest of us to do the right thing. We act like spoiled children and make the moral self-righteousness of this nation a study in hypocrisy. That’s why I revere people who have seen through the nonsense of the Eyman’s, the Tea Partyers, the birthers, the Palinetters, add to the nauseum; as well as the absolute lies and distortions told by the insurance industry and their fellow flim flammers to scare us all back into subjugation. Whether it’s health care or taxes or keeping your job, Hammer you’re getting forced to dance like a puppet every day—we all are. But it’s not government pulling at the reins that are yanking at your bit so uncomfortably.
November 6th, 2009 at 3:05 PM
Comrade Jurgen since capitalism is dead, what ism do you espouse; could it be:
We should not say that one man’s hour is worth another man’s hour, but rather that one man during an hour is worth just as much as another man during an hour. Time is everything, man is nothing: he is at the most time’s carcass.
Karl Marx
I’s prefer capitalism:
It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest.
Adam Smith
AFY!!thesheepdog!!!
November 6th, 2009 at 4:38 PM
Do you really believe this statement? Really?
November 6th, 2009 at 4:55 PM
“The collective body of us, as represented by our government, has to mandate the rest of us to do the right thing.”
“you’re getting forced to dance like a puppet every day… But it’s not government pulling at the reins that are yanking at your bit so uncomfortably.”
haha!
you should work on straightening out what you’re ranting about before tossing in a few big words, and a few insults.
November 6th, 2009 at 5:19 PM
There’s nothing funnier than a confused commie! Unless it happens to be one that really believes what he says!
AFY!!thesheepdog!!!
November 6th, 2009 at 9:01 PM
Because we act like children yes it does.
November 7th, 2009 at 9:47 AM
I have the right to act like a child all I want, provide I don’t interfere with other’s rights to be a nincompoop.
When you interfere my right to act like a child then we have problems.
November 7th, 2009 at 12:00 PM
Calling someone a Commie or quoting Marx or any of that superficial understanding of political systems one got from the History/Poli Sci class they barely paid attention to and got a C- in, does not make one sound enlightened, intelligent or capable of reason. Those are just attempts by people who lack information and perspective to grasp at and conceptualize something that epitomizes the focus of their anger. When people operate from a position of ignorance, their conclusions are always oversimplifications if not total bunk. Sort of like the Teabaggers and birthers and Palenistas. This country has no more chance of becoming a socialist state than it does becoming a free market one. The butcher and baker don’t get to look after their interests anymore, they’ve been smothered by the super corporations and are now just pawns in their game. Capitalism was corrupted by the industrial war complex we built to win WW2, and just as Eisenhower warned, it has controlled the bottom line ever since. What really chafes at most who resort to this simplicity is that which they really can’t attack. The giant multinationals and their money men who dictate everything we say, eat, wear and do.
Go forth and be a child, obviously no one is stopping you.
November 7th, 2009 at 1:35 PM
I thought you just got done saying we need to get the government to control the population because we are all childish?
I take that as you wanting to stop me.
November 7th, 2009 at 5:47 PM
Don’t you get dizzy chasing our tail around like that? It takes a certain maturity to recognize maturity and maybe you’re not there yet, so act like a child, it’s your right, but it doesn’t make it right or something we should ignore, just as you wouldn’t let a child keep burning himself on the stove.
November 7th, 2009 at 7:55 PM
Actually whether or not I act like a child should have no bearing on me being ignored or not.
Yeah, let that kid keep burning himself on a stove, if his parents don’t care what right do I have to intervene my understanding of right or wrong on another?
I’m still kinda confused, you state the government needs to control us because you say so.
Then you berate someone because you state someone controls us, but not the government.
Then you state it’s (assuming gov control) needed because we’re all childish.
And you tell me I’m chasing my tail around and lacking maturity? I’m not the one looking for a nanny.
November 8th, 2009 at 1:27 AM
So if you witness a father abusing his child by allowing him to burn himself on a stove , your idea is to keep quiet. Do us all a favor and don’t have any kids. With your type of reasoning it is better, after all, that you have no progeny to spread such nonsensical logic.
November 8th, 2009 at 1:29 AM
Not only are you chasing your tail, but when you catch it you’re going to discover it wasn’t a tail worth catching.
November 8th, 2009 at 9:01 AM
If I may be permitted to return to the topic of this thread - the solid approval of Ref 71, a civil rights issue which the religious right twisted into a matter of “gay marriage” - Tom Toles, IMHO, has made the definitive comment, which I hope is the last:
http://www.gocomics.com/tomtoles/2009/11/08/
November 8th, 2009 at 11:27 AM
Absolutely, from your mouth to all our ears…
November 8th, 2009 at 5:15 PM
Government and life have a lot in common, it is all about direction.
In life you have choices, different paths one can pick, sometimes those choices are lessened due to responsibilities, but there are always choices, a society that is free allows for those choices.
In government we have choices too, different paths it can pick, and again sometimes those choices are lessened due to responsibilities, but there are always choices, a society that is free allows for those choices.
Where the conflict arises throughout history, is that there are some who think that due to the responsibility of government or of power of government it self, some/more choices should be decided by government and thus denied to the individual, this can come from both the left and the right. To me they are equally wrong when individuals are denied the right to make their own free choices, as long as they are not harming others.
This country was started by individuals who believe that too much government was bad, thus the limitations they placed on it, that premise has been what has made this country great in the past and will in the future.
No government will ever be perfect, but the government that supports the freedom of individuals to make their own choices as much as reasonably they can, that is the government that so many in our past have felt it was worth dying for.
Only among the most arrogrant and closed minded individuals around us, do you find the desire to tell other people, what choices they can have or have not!
The people who think they know what is best for others is most likely the same individuals who in their own life have not known what was best for themselves.
It’s amazing how that works!
AFY!!thesheepdog!!!
November 8th, 2009 at 11:49 PM
“The people who think they know what is best for others is most likely the same individuals who in their own life have not known what was best for themselves.”
which is why i say let the kid burn his hand on a stove.
I decided not to vote on R-71 because it was either me imposing my will, or cheapening the status of my marriage. So I took the ground we really should have been taking all along, ignore it. This isn’t something for the government to have any say in, or me or you for that matter.
November 9th, 2009 at 8:23 AM
Your marriage is ‘cheapened’ by the rights of others to choose their own attachments?
I feel for your wife.
November 9th, 2009 at 8:46 AM
yes citizen, the status is cheapened if the requirements to reach that status are losened.
November 9th, 2009 at 8:58 AM
There are no requirements for marriage.
You can be the lowest scummiest fraud of a bastard that ever lived,
with prostitutes for bed-mates and drugs dripping from every pore,
illegitimate kids in every state and no visible means of support.
And still nobody will tell you that you can’t marry the person of your choosing.
What’s cheap is the idea that you have the right to prevent someone else from making their own choice.
November 9th, 2009 at 9:06 AM
“This isn’t something for the government to have any say in, or me or you for that matter.”
citizen, did you happen to read everything I wrote, or just the stuff that was contrary to you opinions?
November 9th, 2009 at 9:59 AM
The point is that behavior cheapens a relationship, not orientation.
And nothing cheapens the behavior of a person more thoroughly than self-righteous ignorance.
The government establishes a baseline for enforcing every right we have.
And without the backing of US the government,
no one has any rights at all.
November 9th, 2009 at 10:40 AM
The purpose of the government is to secure our rights, not enforce.
Laws provide a means of restricting a right, not enforcing.
This “everything but marriage” law does in fact restrict the rights of some that would chose to not acknowledge some relationships as anything other than a relationship.
But I won’t dismiss the good that is provided by allowing some to chose the relationships they wish to have.
Should never have never required “allowing” or “forcing”. Should have just “been”.
who’s freedom of conscience is most important?
November 9th, 2009 at 11:56 AM
AFY Come on , really?! The government and constitution was formed and written by founding fathers who hated government? Go back to grade school history class. What the founding fathers most feared was the creeping control of the church over government, that’s why they left and came here. They wrote a Constitution and ways of changing it because they recognized that over time, attitudes mature and change or history requires change. You are right that sometimes government can gain too much control and go rogue, as the last administration did and should be in jail for if there truly was justice in this country. Or when a government begins to tell it’s people, like women, that they cannot exercise control over their reproductive system or receive health care monies to do it, based on the religious beliefs and opposition of a religious right wing. Is that the kind of one lording it over the other you’re talking about AFY?
And then comes the leap that because of someone’s opinions about issues you oppose, you can suddenly know all about their lives and whether or not they have made poor choices. What’s amazing is how your mind works sheepy.
And Someguy, allowing gays to marry and have their basic civil rights guaranteed to all is not me imposing my will on you. It is me and others using the legislative process to keep you from imposing your religiously based ideas on the rest of us. You’ve got it all backwards.
Gay marriage will not cheapen anything about your marriage, just as other marriages involved in affairs or divorce does not cheapen my marriage. Only you can cheapen your marriage–it is a private matter of your own to deal with and has nothing to do with anyone else. And neither do the wishes of gays to marry have anything to do with you, or require your acquiescence or acceptance. Your only job is to grow up and get over it. The astonishing thing about religious right wing views and right wing views in general is that they always seek to impose restrictions on things they don’t like or understand that have nothing to do with them. Left wing or moderate views seek to incorporate reality into life while spurning the attempts of others to impose their wills on privacy or behavior that does no harm to the rest of us. In that way views that foment in favor of civil rights for all, or freedom of choice, are best representative of the visions of the founding fathers and the reason they wrote a Constitution to guarantee ways to keep religious zealotry, like we’ve seen in this country for a couple of decades, from running rough shod over those who don’t share the delusions.
November 9th, 2009 at 11:57 AM
“The purpose of the government is to secure our rights, not enforce.
Laws provide a means of restricting a right, not enforcing.”
Tell it to Jim Crow.
November 9th, 2009 at 12:31 PM
Jurgen, how did my inability to be morally for or against this because both impose one’s will on another equate to me wishing to impose my will on others?
R-71 requires public and private entities to respect a relationship as something they may not want to.
If the requirements for a driver’s license are reduced the status of a driver’s license is lessened.
Citizen, maybe I’m dense (it’s likely) but I fail to see how your example is counter to what I posted.
November 9th, 2009 at 1:23 PM
Search Jim Crow and discover why he finally died.