Replies

Ahem, I am not demonizing the ACLU, it's not a 'personal interest', although liberty and the ACLU's attack on liberty and the rule of law should concern *any* Constitutional conservative. Their sorry record speaks for itself.

Your response goes downhill from there.

"To me, the ACLU is overly picky and can be quite annoying at times, but basically they do more good then harm."
You have no basis on which to make that laughable remark. Have you been threatened by too many nativity scenes? Wanted to have your sex business to escape local ordinances? Or maybe offended by the inability of homeless vagrants to live in libraries and offend librarians? It's kind of funny that any anti-social behavior is deemed part of the first amendment; but praying and running for office, they are all for Govt restriction and regulation of that. (sigh)

"I find this curious as the judges went out of their way NOT to decree a solution."

This is a laughable distortion of the court record!
If they wanted not to decree their values, they would have done what courts in most states and the lower court in that state did - say it is a legislative matter.

Which is what it properly should be.

"These are your imperial judges? Your robed elite?
Clearly you are not happy that they found a problem."

They didnt find a problem, they invented one.
There was no problem in law for 500 years in the definition of marriage. The 'problem' is a construct of legal theories that trump the rule of law with judicial-bench legislation.

This is no different than the Supreme Court ruling that said it was UNCONSTITUTIONAL to regulate the working hours of bakers.

" You obviously don't think there is a problem given your suggestion to "Keep things as they were."

frankly I dont see a problem with treating two different things as two different things. I think there is great harm that comes from devaluing the currency of what marriage means, as there is harm in devaluing traditional families and raising up 'non-traditional' families as their equivalent - they are not, and the failure to distinguish harms our children.

If it is a problem, nevertheless, it's the duty of the legislature to attend to such matters. The Massachusetts constitution is quite clear that matters

" But it looks like a majority of the judges found one in terms of how long term gay couples are treated in civil law and they handed it over to the legislature to fix probably figuring that it will respond with some type of compromise as you mentioned."

Again, you display ignorance of the actual ruling and its intended effects. They handed nothing over to the legislature, they usurped legislative authority and gave the legislature a 180 day 'reprieve' to go along with this. This is like a DA convicting a man on false evidence and then "kindly" telling the Judge to be lenient in sentencing!

Why are you hellbent on changing things anyway? Why are you more "ecstatic" to see marriage redefined but care not a whit when the Rule of Law and the separation of powers and democratic right is undermined? I find that set of priorities absurd.

The Ends do not Justify the Means, not in this court nor in other cases.

Uh...anyone else want to jump in here?

I'm not going to argue ACLU with you. Example cases can be brought up on both sides and the details of each can be picked apart for ever.

What I keep trying to come back to is that in the current state of things, injustice was being done. Discrimination was occuring. The civil codes were saying "You married people are entitled to this, this and this. And you gay people aren't. And the courts found no valid reason for the discrimination.

You never really address this. You ask why they (gay couples) should be treated equally when they are not. But never address why they are are not. The best you seem to come up with is "because they always were." I don't find the good enough and neither did the court.

"Why are you hellbent on changing things anyway?"

I am always interested in changing that which I see is unjust and unfair. I believe that denying commited gays couples the rights and priviledges of married couples is just that.

Why are you so hell bent on insuring a civil law distiction between gay and married couples when you or no one else can give me a concrete example of how eliminating the distinction will harm anyone or anything?

Why are you more "ecstatic" to see marriage redefined but care not a whit when the Rule of Law and the separation of powers and democratic right is undermined?

Because I don't accept the premis that separation of powers and democratic rights are undermined. And as I said, the indefensable ruling of Bush vs Gore is far more flagrent example of judicial overreach.

An I don't agree that what I said was a distortion of the court record. They could have ruled that the plaintifs were entitled to marriage licenses. It was in there power to do so. I'm glad they didn't. I'm glad they gave it to the legislature 180 days to deal with this.

You talk about the judges imposing "their" values. I hear this every time a court rules in favor of a gay side in a case. I find it more likly that they found the current standard to be unfair.

But we are dealing with gays here. And a lot of people have problems treating gays fairly.

You never really answered, but I assume the the civil union idea doesn't work for you.

Again, anyone else want to keep this from being the Typesbad-WOSG show? We both seem to be stuck making the same points over and over again.