The Latest Shiny Object To Distract the Plebs [gay marriage]

[Lucille]

The Latest Shiny Object To Distract the Plebs

Gay marriage. Sovereign debt crises, the brink of World War III, the coming American default, a stagnant economy, the police state, and more. These things are mere trifles compared to the great important issue of our time: gay marriage.
[...]
But hey, this is the issue that interests our betters in the media. They know it's a hip and cool topic because their peers told them so at a Nantucket pool party last summer. Getting bummed about war is so 1969. Who needs all that hassle? So bombs away, in Yemen, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc. I'm sure those toddlers deserved to be incinerated. But please come to my gay wedding on Maui! It's important to know what's important.

Get government out of marriage, by the way, and the idea that there even needs to be a "national discussion" on the topic is ludicrous. Which one of the enumerated powers of Article I of that 1787 parchment refers to marriage? None of them.

And...

Obama, Gay Marriage, and Progressivism

...However, there is a larger issue here that both Remocrats and Depublicans will ignore: the origin of marriage laws.

The state laws defining and regulating marriage came about during the Progressive Era as an attempt to prevent black and white intermarriage, or what Progressives called "miscegenation." Before then, marriage was left either to the church or to common law. So, once again we see yet another legacy of that time when America's intellectuals declared war on the Constitution and on liberty itself.

Bonus quote:

"Baby, this shit we got together, it's so good we gotta get the government in on this."
--Doug Stanhope

 

[azxd]

It's so shiny.

 

[Acala]

The strategem has become glaringly obvious. Find an issue that is extremely polarizing, but which leaves the status quo (crony capitalism, endless war, loss of liberty etc.) untouched, and then hype the crap out of it. Have the two annointed non-choices for President stake out highly controversial and news-worthy stances on the non-issue, while quietly agreeing completely on the important issues, to make it seem as if the puppet show has meaning.

Hahahahaha. And the majority of Americans are swept up like so many dust bunnies.

 

[azxd]

Gay Marriage versus Jobs and the Economy ... And Gay Marriage it is.

"Hope" you can afford the "Change" required to get a government sanctioned certificate ... We screwed ya while ya wern't looking.

 

[Lucille]

Yesterday two things happened in North Carolina:

1. BAC held it's Annual Meeting in Charlotte and over the howling protests of an angry mob, including irate shareholders, awarded an obscene bonus package to a CEO totally undeserving of same for a myriad of reasons, including his intimate involvement in the creation of America's Mother of All TBTF shit lockers.

2. The people of North Carolina, in their infinite wisdom of the meaning of privacy and personal liberty, decided to pass a constitutional amendment banning same sex marriage.

As a result, Barrack Obamney announced his support of same sex marriage and Mitt Obamney voiced his continued opposition. The line has been drawn in the sand.

Those naive enough to think the withdrawal of Rick Saint Moron would clear the way for a rational rather than religious public debate of the reasons behind the sad state of the American economy, will be sadly disappointed.

The same sex marriage issue will generate an abundance of distraction running straight into the Democratic Convention, which will be held...where else?
In Charlotte.

So which city gets rewarded with the substantial economic shot of the Democratic Convention? BAC Gay Basher Town USA.

What a nice piece of misdirection. Pure coincidence? Perhaps...then the following won't surprise you either:

FEB 12, NYT--The Human Rights Campaign, a national organization that promotes equal rights for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people, has persuaded Lloyd Blankfein to be its first national corporate spokesman for same-sex marriage.

Persuaded? As I have said before, in matters of crony capitalism, nothing happens by accident.

 

[Lucille]

ZH Guest Post: Obama Embraces Gay Marriage

I’m in favour of consenting adults being able to do whatever they like with each other, but the fact that the current push for gay marriage is supported by Lloyd Blankfein and Goldman Sachs makes me very suspicious (does he want to sell securitised gay marriage debt?).

It just seems like an easy issue for Obama to posture on, while trampling the Constitution into the dirt.

When it comes to civil liberties, Obama has always talked a good game, and then acted more authoritarian than Bush. He talked about an end to the abuses of the Bush years and an open and transparent government, yet extended the Fourth-Amendment-shredding Patriot Act, empowered the TSA to produce naked body scans and engage in humiliatingly sexual pat-downs, signed indefinite detention of American citizens into law, claimed and exercised the power to assassinate American citizens without trial, and aggressively prosecuted whistleblowers. Under his watch the U.S. army even produced a document planning for the reeducation of political activists in internment camps. Reeducation camps? In America? And some on the left are still crowing that talking about being in favour of gay marriage makes him “pro civil liberties”? Is this a joke?
[...]
Meanwhile India, Iran, China, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Japan have all ditched the dollar for other currencies in new bilateral trade agreements — which lest us forget is America’s biggest export, and the product that keeps goods and oil flowing into America. This is an extremely dangerous time. While we cannot lump Obama with the blame for the entire U.S. economic system — the system we have was accumulated via Bush, and Cheney, and Paulson, and Clinton, and Bush, and Reagan, and Carter, and Brzezinski, and Nixon, and Kissinger, and Johnson, and Roosevelt and Wilson and Lincoln and probably most significantly of all the father of central banking Alexander Hamilton — Obama certainly has not improved matters.

And it should be obvious to anyone paying attention that Romney — who claims he would support the NDAA and the PATRIOT Act, that he wants to attack Iran, and has hired many ex-Bush staffers, as well as winning the endorsement of both Jeb and George H.W. Bush, and bizarrely claiming to want to start a trade war with China — is cut from the exact same cloth as Bush and Obama.

This is a dead election. Here’s hoping that Ron Paul — who continues to pick up delegates in the Republican race even while being ignored by the mainstream media who would rather talk about Obama’s posturing on gay rights — can cause some mayhem.

 

[Brian4Liberty]

I’m in favour of consenting adults being able to do whatever they like with each other, but the fact that the current push for gay marriage is supported by Lloyd Blankfein and Goldman Sachs makes me very suspicious (does he want to sell securitised gay marriage debt?)

Now that was good.

 

[Lucille]

Now that was good.

It was! Related:

Naturally, marriage, being what it is, did nevertheless impact the distribution and ownership of property. Who were the legitimate heirs of a married couple, for example? Could Bastard Jimmy inherit the property of his father instead of First Born Tom who was the child of both dad and his wife? These considerations attracted the state’s attention.

The state hates it when property changes hands without being taxed and regulated, so the state set its sights on marriage centuries ago. Over time civil governments inserted themselves more and more into the religious institutions of marriage. This was helped along by the Reformation and by defenders of government-controlled marriage like King Henry VIII of England. As nation-states consolidated their monopolies on all law and over all institutions in society, the state finally displaced religious institutions as the final arbiter on marriage.

So yes, Ann, there is a reason that governments control marriage: They couldn’t keep their mitts off it.

 

[ZENemy]

President Obama made what's being heralded as a big announcement on same sex marriage. "I've just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married," Obama told ABC News in an interview broadcast this morning. Obama's the first sitting president to come out in favor of same sex marriage.
Barack Obama

But what this might actually mean in terms of policy is a little murkier. Perhaps most pressing is the issue of a so-called "nondiscrimination executive order" that gay-rights groups have been pushing. The president has refused—and continues to refuse—to sign it.

"The order, which has been drafted for months awaiting the president’s signature, would prohibit discrimination by federal contractors on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity," the Washington Post reported. "It has become a major focus for gay-rights groups, but in recent weeks activists began to worry that the White House might opt against approval."

Obama's announcement today gives no indication that he's changed his mind on this issue.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs...nondiscrimination-executive-order_644332.html

 

[James Madison]

In an unrelated and not as important footnote...

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/10/w...study-estimates.html?_r=2&partner=rss&emc=rss

 

[Zippyjuan]

The issue will probably not have much impact on the election- it will be well forgotten by November. It just gives the media something different to talk about for a few days. Obama said it should be up to the states to decide what is considered marriage and Romney wants a Constitutional amendment to define what marriage is.

 

[DerailingDaTrain]

ZH Guest Post: Obama Embraces Gay Marriage

Saw this earlier. People are cheering him for it. He said he would leave it up to the states but he doesn't respect state right's at all.

 

[Zippyjuan]

Saw this earlier. People are cheering him for it. He said he would leave it up to the states but he doesn't respect state right's at all.

Did he say the federal government should say what marriage is- or did he express his own personal feelings on the subject? I believe it was the latter. I have not seen any calls by him to pass any sort of federal law on the issue. Perhaps you can find us one. Thanks!

 

[Lucille]

Saw this earlier. People are cheering him for it. He said he would leave it up to the states but he doesn't respect state right's at all.

Like so many Republicans, he's a fair weather federalist.

Obama personally supports their right to marry but still favors a state-by-state approach to the issue. And even if you think the state-by-state approach is best, you can nod your head when Radley Balko points out the skewed priorities implicit in the president's on-again, off-again approach to federalism: "Obama apparently believes the states should be able to discriminate when it comes to marriage benefits, but if they allow cancer and AIDS patients to smoke pot, he asserts the supremacy of federal law, and sends in the SWAT teams."

 

[azxd]

People who want to believe him, fall for the dumbest lines.

 

[DerailingDaTrain]

Did he say the federal government should say what marriage is- or did he express his own personal feelings on the subject? I believe it was the latter. I have not seen any calls by him to pass any sort of federal law on the issue. Perhaps you can find us one. Thanks!

Where in my post did you see the words "pass a federal law on the issue". Perhaps you can show me.

I said:

He said he would leave it up to the states but he doesn't respect state right's at all.

Are you sure you replied to the right post?

Or are you denying that Obama doesn't respect state right's? Just ask California.

 

[Zippyjuan]

Sorry I misunderstood.

 

[DerailingDaTrain]

Sorry I misunderstood.

Sorry for coming off as a dick in my reply.

 

[Zippyjuan]

I perhaps deserved it. I can see with the way I pharsed it you might take a defensive attitude. Thanks.