Bush attacking the Gay Community again.

[Guest LiveFastDieNever]

I'm . . . not even remotely talking about . . . the amendment proposal . . . at all?

 

*lost*

[EricMM 0]

You're also not the Republican Party.

 

I appreciate what you're saying, I'm just saying that I'm not rallying against you, and I'm saying what I am rallying against.

 

If you feel the way you do, you should march against this amendmant also. You can make more lesbian friends

[Guest LiveFastDieNever]

They can be some of the most fun, for certain. Tracking with you now.

[Big Ol' Smitty 0]

http://youtube.com/watch?v=EDG7Pg59o7g&sea...0bill%20bennett

 

Jon Stewart actually laid out a pretty decent pro-gay-marriage argument against Bill Bennett last night on TDS. Bill Bennett had a tough time because he was obviously in hostile territory, but I think he also had a hard time because the arguments against gay marriage tend to be pretty lame.

[Dr. Zaius 0]

People only seem to be against gay marriage because other people are against it, i.e. the majority doesn't want this imposed on them or most beleive believe its wrong.

[Dobbs 3K 0]

Well, my take is, as a Lutheran I don't feel I should have to support or endorse a lifestyle choice that I feel is morally wrong. However, as an American I can accept the fact that people are free to live how they want, as long as they're not hurting anyone else.

 

If someone wants to live with their gay partner, that's fine, I won't stop you or try to change your mind. I could even see granting some rights to gay couples similar to the rights heterosexual married couples have. However, I don't feel it's right to outright have marriage between two men or two women.

 

I think part of the problem is we're getting the religious institution of marriage intertwined with the government's definition of a family. I think some kind of civil rights act for gay people to have some of the same rights as straight married couples would be fine, I guess. I just don't think I should have to accept two gay people as being "married" just like a straight couple is.

[Special K 0]

Well, there are churches and ministers that will marry gay couples.

 

The biggest problem I have is that in many states, a lifelong partner can be banned from hospital visitation rights by a bigoted family. That's FUCKED up. I don't care what you believe, there's no moral justification for that.

[snuffbox 0]

I wonder if America has ever had a similar debate about basic human equality...say, around the Nineteenth Century.

[Guest Overworked]

It seems the courts who claim to be doing the right thing is only making it more difficult making the pretty basic issue of two people happy in love and wanting to get married into a political mess of the courts trying to overrule the law. Things change and evolve on their own, trying to Punt things along by using your Court appointed powers will only piss off those trying desperately to maintain what they believe to be a status quo.

[SuperJerk 0]

Well, my take is, as a Lutheran I don't feel I should have to support or endorse a lifestyle choice that I feel is morally wrong. However, as an American I can accept the fact that people are free to live how they want, as long as they're not hurting anyone else.

 

If someone wants to live with their gay partner, that's fine, I won't stop you or try to change your mind. I could even see granting some rights to gay couples similar to the rights heterosexual married couples have. However, I don't feel it's right to outright have marriage between two men or two women.

 

I think part of the problem is we're getting the religious institution of marriage intertwined with the government's definition of a family. I think some kind of civil rights act for gay people to have some of the same rights as straight married couples would be fine, I guess. I just don't think I should have to accept two gay people as being "married" just like a straight couple is.

I don't think you should see the government allowing gays to marry as the same thing as you personally endorsing of homosexuality.

[Guest Overworked]

People only seem to be against gay marriage because other people are against it, i.e. the majority doesn't want this imposed on them or most beleive believe its wrong.

 

See heres where I hit the speedbump. I keep hearing the tag line "We are not against gay union but are for protecting Marriage". What are you protecting it from? More people actually having it? What will absolutely destroy or devalue every marriage in america if a single gay couple gets hitched? What will happen seriously?

 

It sometimes frustrates me that a bunch of strangers would have such a fit over the concept of people, they don't even know, or have any idea that they exist up until now want to get married because they are the same gender. Somehow these people who want to be married this is somehow damaging your their lives, despite the fact these conservatives are thousands of miles away and have no idea who this couple even is. That gay people cannot have the option of marriage because that might disrupt the delicate flow of a Christian conservative's day? Whatever arguments are put out there, there are valid counter arguements and precidence. It wasn't too far in our past when the coupling of a Black man and a white woman was taboo, and the reverse something to snicker at. and for the two to get married ohthe society was going to crumble. Or Catholics marrying Jews, or whatever. It seems to be just another rung in the evolutionary ladder of society, the same opponents to gay marriage were probably the same type who were against interracial marriage or interfaith marriage back in the day.

[snuffbox 0]

This is the same country that instituted laws to keep black people from marrying white people...

[EricMM 0]

What will absolutely destroy or devalue every marriage in america if a single gay couple gets hitched? What will happen seriously?

 

Good Heavens, sir! Just look at Scandinavia!

[SuperJerk 0]

Senate blocks same-sex marriage ban

Conservatives cite progress, plan to keep focus on issue

 

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Senate blocked on Wednesday a bid to amend the Constitution to essentially ban same-sex marriage.

 

Proponents failed to get the 60 votes needed to end debate and move to a vote on the actual amendment.

 

The Senate vote was 49-48 to end debate, or invoke cloture. (Watch why the Senate vote tally may have surprised conservatives -- 3:22)

 

Conservative Republicans, looking to solidify their base in an election year, pushed the plan even as they conceded it did not have enough votes to pass. After the vote, they pledged to keep the issue in the spotlight.

 

"We're going to continue to press this issue," Colorado Republican Sen. Wayne Allard said. "If it's up to me, we'll have a vote on this issue every year."

 

"We're making progress, and we're not going to stop until marriage between a man and a woman is protected," said Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kansas.

 

"We have 45 states that have defined marriage as the union of a man and a woman," Brownback said. "Since the last time we voted in the Senate, we've seen a total of 14 states take this issue up on the ballot -- on the ballot -- and you've got another seven set for this fall."

 

Meanwhile, House Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, said the same-sex marriage amendment will come before that body next month, The Associated Press reported.

 

"This is an issue that is of significant importance to many Americans," Boehner said. "We have significant numbers of our members who want a vote on this, so we are going to have a vote."

 

Opponents called the measure an election-year ploy that wasted precious time on the legislative calendar.

 

"This is not about the preservation of marriage. This is about the preservation of a majority," Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Illinois, said as debate started Wednesday. "I think, sadly, most people realize there's political motivation here."

 

Sen. Ted Kennedy, a Massachusetts Democrat, denounced the proposed amendment Tuesday as "an instrument of bigotry and prejudice," which he said was designed by the GOP leadership "to try to bring Republican senators out of the ditch of disapproval."

 

And Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, said that "the reason the Senate Republicans are pushing this marriage amendment is because they don't want to address the real issues of this country."

 

"This is an effort by the president and the majority in the House and the Senate to distort, to misdirect what the real issues are," he said. (Watch the politics behind the proposed ban -- 4:32)

 

The vote began around 10 a.m., after a final hour of debate. The Senate began debate on the amendment Monday afternoon.

 

Even if the measure had been able to clear the procedural vote, a two-thirds majority -- 67 votes -- would be required for final approval by the Senate of a constitutional amendment -- an even higher hurdle to overcome.

 

The last time the Senate voted on the amendment, in July 2004, only 48 senators supported it and 50 were opposed.

 

Spurred on by religious conservatives in his political base, President Bush had called on the Senate to approve the amendment, saying it was necessary to protect the institution of marriage from state court decisions striking down marriage laws that exclude gay and lesbian couples.

 

So far that has happened in just one state, Massachusetts, where same-sex marriages became legal in 2003, although court cases are pending in other states.

 

To become part of the Constitution an amendment needs approval from at least two-thirds of the Senate (67 of the 100 members); at least two-thirds of the House (290 of the 435 members); and three-fourths of the states (38 of the 50 states), or by a convention called by three-fourths of the states.

 

In the nearly 220 years since the Constitution was written, only 27 amendments have made it through this arduous approval process, the most recent in 1992 governing the timing of changes in congressional compensation. No amendment has been approved by a convention.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/06/07/sam...iage/index.html

[Big Ol' Smitty 0]

Couldn't even get a bare majority.

 

"We're going to continue to press this issue," Colorado Republican Sen. Wayne Allard said. "If it's up to me, we'll have a vote on this issue every year."

 

Yay.

 

Somebody get this guy out of my Senate.

[Guest Felonies!]

Good, it failed, now I never want to hear about this bullshit amendment thing again. If Montana says it don't want none them queers gettin' marriaged, then okay, whatever, but this isn't really U.S. Constitution material here.

 

I wonder if America has ever had a similar debate about basic human equality...say, around the Nineteenth Century.

Sorry, but I've never believed the "blacks : whites :: gays : straights" thing.

[EricMM 0]

In that they are both debates...

[snuffbox 0]

Again, this country has initiated laws in the past to prevent interracial marriage...stuff like that is embarassing to our history.

 

Maybe Im just the only one who sees the comparison between one group of people not being allowed to marry and another group of people not being allowed to marry...

[Guest Felonies!]

I'm talking on a bigger scale, the people who say "OUR fight is just like the civil rights movement!" and all that jazz. I don't think it's of the same magnitude.

[snuffbox 0]

No, because gay people arent being told where to use the restroom or restaurants or water fountains. But the Mann Act was passed to prevent interracial marriage and our modern day Senate attempted to ban another group of people from marrying. I think theres a pretty obvious correlation there.

[NoCalMike 0]

The question here is: Is Marriage a religious institution or a State/Federal institution? If it is state sponsored then eventually it is going to become illegal on the grounds of civil rights.

 

No one is forcing a church or a priest/rabbi/pastor to marry a gay couple, but a judge at city hall will have the obligation.

[EricMM 0]

The argument is whether or not Judeo-Christian values have any place in society's rules.

[Dobbs 3K 0]

Well, our nation and laws are built on Judeo-Christian views, so I would say that "yes", they do have a place.

 

I heard Bill O'Reilly put forth an interesting argument on gay marriage yesterday on his radio show. He claims he doesn't care either way if they legalize it, but questioned "If gay marriage is legal, than where is the line drawn? Do you have to also then make polygamy legal as well?"

 

I don't necessarily think making gay marriage legal means the start of a "slippery slope", but he has something of a point.

[NoCalMike 0]

The argument is whether or not Judeo-Christian values have any place in society's rules.

 

 

The answer is no. They have place in a church among believers, but they have no place in my home. They definately do not belong in the law books.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Well, our nation and laws are built on Judeo-Christian views, so I would say that "yes", they do have a place.

 

I heard Bill O'Reilly put forth an interesting argument on gay marriage yesterday on his radio show. He claims he doesn't care either way if they legalize it, but questioned "If gay marriage is legal, than where is the line drawn? Do you have to also then make polygamy legal as well?"

No, you don't. I hate the slippery slope argument, especially here, when it's made so poorly. The connection between a one-to-one marriage and a one-to-many marriage is hazy at best. The notion of "I love this person and want to marry him/her" is the same whether you're talking man/woman or man/man or woman/woman. The polygamy thing is just a straw man thrown out there by people who don't want to be laughed at for saying "We could have people marrying dogs next!"

 

Then there'd be different tax issues for multi-spousal homes, among other things. And honestly, I doubt I'd really care if people wanted a bunch of wives, as long as they take care of their kids and don't get huge tax breaks out of it.

[Guest Felonies!]

The argument is whether or not Judeo-Christian values have any place in society's rules.

 

 

The answer is no. They have place in a church among believers, but they have no place in my home. They definately do not belong in the law books.

The laws of Western civilization have been taking cues from Judeo-Christian values for years, though.

[SuperJerk 0]

Well, our nation and laws are built on Judeo-Christian views, so I would say that "yes", they do have a place.

Our nation may have been founded by the descendants of colonists fleeing religious persecution, but our national government and system of laws were built more on the ideas of the Greeks and the Romans than anything in the Bible. Those things which we hold dear that have the force of law behind them are based on something other than Biblical inspiration.

 

I'm talking on a bigger scale, the people who say "OUR fight is just like the civil rights movement!" and all that jazz. I don't think it's of the same magnitude.

While homosexuals aren't the victims of widescale, institutionalized economic subjugation that African-Americans have been, all the other ugly symptoms of mass bigotry are there.

[Guest Felonies!]

Yeah, like gentrifying blighted neighborhoods

[Slayer 0]

God didn't want SP to remember his old account password

[Your Paragon of Virtue 0]

To Edwin: I don't see how you could disallow polygamy if someone wanted it, and I also think that it's a pretty clear case of being hypocritical. How can someone advocate gay marriage by criticizing anti-gay marriage folk for refusing to change the definition from marriage being between a man and a woman, and than saying they only want to change it to being between two people? By that token, they're discriminating against those that want to marry more than one person. It kind of is the same argument.