I protest.

Poverty and arrogance.

In Notes on the Atrocities Jeff writes about a Rich Lowry column he read in his local newspaper. He didn't have a link to it, but the National Review Online has the column. I'm not going to link to it, if you want to read it, you can do a search as I did. In that column, Lowry says the following:

Poverty in America is primarily a cultural phenomenon, driven by a shattered work ethic and sexual irresponsibility.

That's the bit that Jeff quoted. It's an astonishing assertion. Worse, he goes on:

Child poverty would be nearly obliterated if every household had one adult working full time and married parents.

Naturally, he refers to a "welfare expert" at the Heritage Foundation, an ultraconservative outfit that is utterly unashamed to publish lies and distortions as facts if it will promote their social agenda. This "expert" claims that "the typical poor family with children is supported by only 800 hours of work annually, or about 16 hours a week. This number holds in good economic times and bad, because it is a factor of attitudes toward work rather than the availability of jobs."

So. The reason these families are poor is because the parents don't want to work. Pretty amazing. I wish that someone had told my parents that, when I was growing up. Oh, wait, my parents did work. Both of them. My father fulltime and my mother varying between part-time and fulltime. And somehow, in spite of them working so much, we were still poor.

Rich Lowry is a pig-ignorant moron who not only has obviously not had to do an honest day's work in his life, but who has no experience whatsoever with poverty in any way, shape or form. It's blindingly obvious that this idiot doesn't even know any poor people.

I do.

I know women who have had to work two part-time jobs (not one, Rich, two) just to barely make ends meet for themselves and their children. Lowry claims that "the other cause of child poverty is single parenthood." These women, though, have had single parenthood forced upon them, by having their husband abscond or having finally had the fortitude to leave after being abused over the course of years.

I also know two-parent families (more common than the single parents), who both have to work, sometimes two jobs, just to make sure their children have food to eat and a place to sleep. Lowry claims that "the problem is not low wages." These individuals would disagree. That is, they would disagree if they had time, but they are spending all of their time working, taking care of their children or sleeping.

Rich, let's see you support a family of four on a Wal-Mart salary. Oh, yeah, and your wife can't work, because as you say, "child poverty would be nearly obliterated if every household had one adult working full time and married parents."

Of course, Rich will never, ever even consider for a second actually going and seeing for himself what it's like to be poor. I suppose that being around all those smelly poor people would make him all uncomfortable, so he would rather stay in his nice, expensive apartment or house, drinking his expensive wine and eating his expensive meals. Rich doesn't have to worry about where he's going to get the money for rent this month (or any month), and I'll bet anything that he pays someone (one of those smelly poor people, most likely) to buy his groceries.

Yeah, it's nice to be able to afford nice things and it's really, really nice to not have to worry about how you're going to pay for rent and food. I know, I earn a nice salary as a software engineer. I was fortunate enough and had enough innate talent to be able to go to college and then to have a good career doing something at which I'm very good and which just happens to pay well. I'm lucky. Unlike Rich, however, I haven't forgotten that I'm lucky. Unlike Rich, I know what it's like to have hungry times, what it's like to worry about the rent, what it's like to go to the grocery store with seven dollars to buy groceries for a week (1985, with my then-wife, we ate a lot of beans that week).

Rich Lowry is lucky as well. He's luckier than I am, because he's never had to live as a poor person. He's just too much of a damned fool to know or admit just how lucky he is. And he's too fucking arrogant to admit that poor people are just like him, except for an accident of birth.

Were there justice in this world, Lowry and his kin would get to experience firsthand the rigors of poverty and would get to discover a little bit of the truth of the world, rather than the fantasyland in which they live.

A fantasyland in which they condemn the poor just for being poor.

Unfortunately, there is no justice.

Call it what it is!

I'm tired of the idiots setting the tone of the debate. I applaud the city of San Francisco and the mayor of that city for defying a California law that codifies discrimination based on sexual orientation. I applaud the justices of the Massachusetts Supreme Court who did indeed call this discrimination what it is in truth: it is bigotry.

It's bigotry because, for no reason aside from blind, unreasoning fear, a whole class of citizens is denied a human right, the right to marry. Were marriage not so important in our society and in our culture this wouldn't matter so much, but it is and it does.

We must stop letting the idiots frame the argument and choose the terms. This is the latest battle in a long war that started with women's suffrage in the 19^th century. The last big battle was the one fought by people like Martin Luthor King, Jr., for equal rights for minorities. Well, gay people are a minority and if you discriminate against them you are as much a bigot as was George Wallace, Strom Thurmond or Trent Lott.

The California law was passed out of bigotry. I voted against it. Did you?

The new Georgia law? Bigotry.

Bob Parks of ChronWatch, a conservative so-called "media watchdog?" A bigot. Oh, and, Bob? Yes, it fucking well is a civil right!

Colorado Representative Marilyn Musgrave? President George W. Bush? Bigots, both of them.

Colorado Representative Diane DeGette? Not a bigot:

"Allowing gay and lesbian couples to marry, I'm pleased to say, will not impact the sanctity of my marriage," Rep. Diane DeGette, D-Col.o., said.

She said any couple who thinks their marriage would be undermined by a gay couple's "will need a marriage counselor, not a constitutional amendment."

Indeed.

Stop letting the bigots control the debate. It's a simple matter: Either you are a bigot or you are not. If you oppose gay marriage and support some kind of constitutional amendment to ban it, you're a bigot. Period.

Remember when the bigots were claiming that allowing "miscegenation" (that is, allowing whites and blacks to marry) would be the end of marriage? They haven't even found any new words for their bigotry. Same shit, different century.

As far as I'm concerned, my marriage is just fine, and I need neither a marriage counselor nor a constitutional amendment to keep it that way.

Call it what it is! Bigotry. Bigotry. Bigotry.

Ninety-four percent.

Today, "Atrios points out an important fact. He links to the PBS article American Love Stories.

A couple of days ago I wrote,

Remember when the bigots were claiming that allowing "miscegenation" (that is, allowing whites and blacks to marry) would be the end of marriage? They haven't even found any new words for their bigotry. Same shit, different century.

It turns out that the PBS article has a whole lot to say about this particular subject. I didn't realize when I wrote those sentences just how true they are. Here are a few snippets from the article, just to illustrate this:

In the years after the Civil War, it was an eagerness to "preserve the integrity of the white race" by preventing the birth of mixed-race children that in great part motivated states to pass miscegenation laws. Some states, like California, chose to specifically prohibit "intermarriage of white persons with Chinese, Negroes, mulattos, or persons of mixed blood descended from a Chinaman or Negro from the third generation inclusive." In 1869, a Georgia judge blocked the marriage of a white Frenchman and a black woman by saying, "The amalgamation of the races is not only unnatural but is always productive of deplorable results. Our daily observations show us that the offspring of these unnatural connections are generally sick and effeminate." And a Missouri judge in 1883 prevented an intermarriage, because, "It is stated as a well authenticated fact that if the [children] of a black man and white woman, and a white man and a black woman intermarry, they cannot possibly have any progeny, and such a fact sufficiently justifies those laws which forbid the intermarriage of blacks and whites."

The ignorant still believe that when a gay couple raise a child, that child will also be gay, as if homosexuality is something that is learned. These people are just as ignorant as those judges, and with less excuse, since at least now the truth is available if you want to look at it. More relevant to the current furor, though, is this bit:

In contrast to the ignorance that muddied such racist rulings, the clearer prejudice of Virginia's Judge Leon Bazile in the famous 1959 Loving case (in which a black man and white woman were sentenced to prison for trying to circumvent Virginia law by marrying in Washington DC) is almost refreshing. "Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, Maylay and red, and he placed them on separate continents," he said. "And but for the interference with His arrangement, there would be no cause for such marriages."

Compare that assertion with this one from a petition being run by an organization of bigots:

Traditional marriage between a man and woman is the God-ordained building block of the family and bedrock of a civil society.

Or how about, from a source of religious bigotry,

Marriage is ordained by God to be between a man and a woman (Genesis 2:21-24; Matthew 19:4-6). Homosexual marriage is a perversion of the institution of marriage and an offense to the God who created marriage. God forbids and condemns homosexuality, so He clearly is opposed to homosexual marriage.

Or, according to the Southern Bigots Convention,

By upholding God's original plan for human sexuality, [Jesus] automatically condemned any deviation from that standard. We should not need a constitutional amendment to tell us what God has said from the beginning: Marriage is for a man and a woman. Period. I realize it is trite, but it is nevertheless true: The first couple God placed in the Garden was Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.

In 1959, Judge Bazile believed his words with all his heart, and believed that he was upholding "God's law." Fewer than fifty years later, similar idiots are just as fervent in their advocacy of the same set of beliefs, only this time as applied to gay people. There is no difference between Bazile's declaration and any of the three I quoted.

So, yes, this is the miscegenation battle once again. And the opposition is using the same tired, foolish and deeply ignorant arguments that they used the last time.

Bigots, all of them.

Oh, and the ninety-four percent? That was the percentage of whites in a Gallup poll in 1958 that opposed interracial marriage.

Fighting for the right.

Over on TalkLeft, in the comments to "S.F. to Continue Issuing Gay Marriage Licenses," I've been conducting a pretty heated argument with a couple anti-gay-marriage bigots. One of these persons, one Patrick, has continued to deny his bigotry even as he has displayed it. His best argument against gay marriage so far has been that "most people oppose it, therefore it should be illegal."

My parting comment was to be an explanation of just why I engaged in this argument. Unfortunately before I could post it, I was "warned," the term I used ("bigot") was removed in several places and comments were closed for that article. I had planned to post most of that comment here but now I suppose I'll just post it all.

That comment follows….

I realize that in many ways this kind of argument is futile. Patrick and "IWW" have their minds made up and no amount of evidence, hard fact or reasoned discourse will influence them. If anything, it will only make them cling more tightly to their bigotry and ignorance, since to them a contradiction of their cherished preconceptions is a threat to themselves, as individuals. It is a threat to their egos, to their self-images, since their self-images and egos are tied up in those preconceptions. I couldn't be more threatening to Patrick if I were coming at him with a knife. (If anything, he would likely find that easier to handle, since it wouldn't challenge his ego.)

I don't typically stoop to name-calling and I have a strong reason to call Patrick and "IWW" bigots. It is because that is what they are. If you oppose gay marriage on principle, then you're a bigot. Just like if someone in 1958 opposed interracial marriage, they were a bigot. These people like to call the rest of us "ignorant," "misguided," "twisted," or that worst of all labels, "liberal" (as if being a liberal were something of which to be desperately ashamed). It is past time to take the discourse back. If someone is a bigot, call them a bigot. Don't spare their feelings and don't consider all sides. Yeah, there are shades of gray, but these days the fight (and it's not a debate, it's a fight) is pretty clearly a fight between right and wrong. It's wrong to discriminate based on sexual orientation. It's wrong to lock someone up forever without charge or due process on the arbitrary say-so of one man. It is wrong to steal from the poor to line the pockets of the rich. It's wrong to censor the truth if it contradicts a favored political opinion.

There are shades of gray, but they're in the middle. Right now, though, we're not in the middle. A bunch of people have dragged us all over into an area that's pretty damned black. It's time, and past time, to do something about it. It's time to put away sensibility and express ourselves clearly, succinctly and without pulling any punches.

Call a liar a liar, call a bigot a bigot, call a damned fool a damned fool and call a criminal a criminal, even if he has gotten away with his crime. If we don't do this, certainly no one else will.

Marc Racicot is a fucking liar.

Racicot claimed on NPR this morning that Dubya "volunteered" for duty in Viet Nam but was turned down. Well, here's the disproof of that assertion, straight from the document he signed:

Of course, Juan Williams (the interviewer) let him get away with it, too. Idiot.

UPDATE (Feb. 26, 9:45AM): Credit where credit is due: I didn't scan the document above, it is from (and actually lives on) Take Back The Media! My apologies if anyone assumed that I was the source, I should have been more clear.

This is a politician?

Last night and this morning CNN had an article (now gone from its front page) about San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, "Mayor defends same-sex marriages." I already knew that Newsom is one of the good guys in this particular fight, but what I read in the article really surprised me. The bottom line, as Newsom put it in an interview on the CNN show "Late Edition:"

"I think we're on firm legal footing and legal grounds, and certainly I believe very strongly and passionately we're on the right moral ground." …

"I will not abdicate and step back and say what we were doing 10, 15 days ago -- before this action -- is appropriate." … "I do not believe it's appropriate for me, as mayor of San Francisco, to discriminate against people."

"And if that means my political career ends, so be it."

This guy is quite clearly not a politician of any kind with which I am familiar. In general, the politicians with whom I am familiar are about as likely to put their career on the line for a principle as Marc Racicot is to publically endorse Hillary Clinton for President.

Unbelievable. Let's run this guy for President!

Petard hoisting time.

Billmon has a great idea in Letter Rip at the Whiskey Bar. He suggests that we use the letter-writing tool at the Bush reelection website to write our local (and perhaps nonlocal) newspapers in opposition to Bush's promotion of the "marriage amendment." I just sent a set of letters to the LA Times, the Orange County Register and a few other, smaller papers.

This is a great way to turn the Republican mechanisms to the advantage of Democrats and the rest of us liberals. Go write some letters!.

Why Bush doesn't care about the FMA.

Magpie at Pacific Views mentions some "Good news, maybe." Apparently there aren't enough Senate votes to pass the "Federal Marriage Act." This is a relief, yes, but as far as BushRove is concerned, it doesn't matter. Of course Bush endorsed the Act to garner support from his loony religious right base, or at least so as not to lose it. This is a win/win for him, ignoring for the moment the fact that he just lost any support from anyone who cares about the issue (can you say "Andrew Sullivan?"). It's simple: He endorses the Act. If it passes, great, he wins. If it fails, which it will, that's fine too, because the reason it will fail will be opposition from all us nasty Leftist, Liberal, atheist, secular humanist types.

At least, that's how the Loony Right will see it.

So Bush is safe. He's done what he had to do to pander to the religious loons and he won't be blamed when gay marriage becomes an established fact in every state. There's no downside.

Well, except for the minor fact that he'll be out on his ear in November, but let's not tell him about that, okay?

Impeach Scalia.

It turns out that Scalia's little duck-hunting trip with Chaney was nothing new, at least according to the LA Times: Scalia Took Trip Set Up by Lawyer in Two Cases. It appears that he took a pheasant-hunting trip with and arranged by Stephen McAllister, the Dean of the University of Kansas School of Law. As it happens, two weeks before the trip, McAllister argued in defense of

a Kansas law to confine sex offenders after they complete their prison terms.

Two weeks after the trip, the dean was before the high court to lead the state's defense of a Kansas prison program for treating sex criminals.

Scalia was hosted by McAllister, who also served as Kansas state solicitor, when he visited the law school to speak to students. At Scalia's request, McAllister arranged for the justice to go pheasant hunting after the law school event.

Scalia sided with Kansas in both of the cases McAllister argued.

Scalia's response?

"I do not think that spending time at a law school in which the counsel in pending cases was the dean could reasonably cause my impartiality to be questioned. Nor could spending time with the governor of a state that had matters before the court."

Well, call me unreasonable, but it certainly causes me to question his impartiality. Others seem to be a tad concerned as well. Consider that

Federal law says that "any justice or judge shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might be questioned."

Whether or not these events actually compromised Scalia's "impartiality" (not that Scalia even knows the meaning of that word, much less applies it to his own life), it certainly calls that impartiality into question publically. I have a very low opinion of Scalia at the best of times, but in my view this pretty much proves that the man is simply not suited to be a Supreme Court Justice. It is clear that he cannot or will not keep his personal life and views separate from his professional, legal duties and obligations.

The man should not be on the Supreme Court.

Civil rights and marriage.

Last week I ranted a bit about the bigotry of those opposed to gay people getting married. In that rant, I pointed out one Bob Parks, a bigot who writes for the conservative site ChronWatch and who wrote a really nasty little screed that denies that marriage is a civil right (among other things; he basically regurgitates every homophobic cliché there is). I mentioned in passing that marriage, er, "fucking well is a civil right!"

That marriage is a civil right was something I knew but couldn't prove without research, which at the time I hadn't done. Well, Atrios did the research for me. It just so happens that Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren, in the ruling regarding Loving v. Virginia in 1967, wrote the following:

II.

These statutes also deprive the Lovings of liberty without due process of law in violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The freedom to marry has long been recognized as one of the vital personal rights essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men.

Marriage is one of the "basic civil rights of man," fundamental to our very existence and survival. To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State's citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discriminations. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State.

Emphasis mine.

Marriage is a civil right according to the Supreme Court of the United States. Laws banning gay marriage are simply unconstitutional.

As far as the argument that gay people can marry (they just can't marry persons of the same sex) and therefore their civil rights aren't being violated is simply nonsensical. I wonder how the proponents of that particular argument would feel if they were told that they could marry anyone they neither loved nor to whom they were sexually attracted, while they were not allowed to marry anyone they both loved and were attracted to? I suspect that they would scream bloody murder, and for good reason.

And, of course, the hoary old "slippery slope" arguments are even more absurd, if that's possible.

It is time for both arguments to be put away for good.