Right wing hero, Ken Starr, who obsessed over Bill Clinton's sex life then printed a very detailed report on that subject, has become the leader of the anti-gay marriage legal strategy. He's the point guy in the California case to defeat the suits designed to overturn Prop. 8. (No doubt practicing arguments for an eventual Supreme Court case.)
Yesterday, Starr was in Nashville at the National Religious Broadcasters convention talking about his legal strategy. Jeremy at GoodAsYou.org has the details:
One Kenneth Winston Starr was in Nashville today, explaining how, exactly, he plans to defend bias and majority tyranny when he defends Prop 8 in the Supreme Court. This from Baptist Press:Jeremy is right. But, fairness isn't a factor for right-wing religious zealots like Starr. Jeremy also caught one other point, which "sounds quite concessionary" from Starr:"What is being argued before the California Supreme Court is: Do the people have power under the California constitution to amend the constitution so as to overturn a specific decision of the California Supreme Court? It's a very important but nonetheless different issue than the underlying constitutional issue of the right to marry someone of the same sex," said Starr, who has not been granting media interviews about the case.Well he's mostly right here: It is a very different question than the initial marriage ruling. But the question of a bare majority's right to rollback a ruling is not the ONLY question. Another question is if Prop 8, regardless of the people's right or not to put it into place, itself violates crucial constitutional protections. Attorney General Jerry Brown is arguing that certain rights are inalienable, with the right to marry being one of them. So the whole case is not purely purely built around the matter of California procedure -- there are crucial matters of fairness here as well. They should not go unnoted.
"I've seen very thoughtful Christians say, 'Get the state out of this. ... If you want to be married by your priest, rabbi, minister, pastor, great -- call it whatever you want. [But when you're] welcome to city hall, it's a civil union.' That may be the eventual way that we need to go, because you see the culture war that is so unfortunate."In an off-the-record meeting, a very wise man once said to me "Every marriage should be a civil union." That's right. In most countries, marriages are conducted by the government, then couples can go off to church to have a ceremony. Yet, in the United States, which purports to have a separation of church and state, the state actually makes religious personnel agents of the state to conduct a state-function: Marriage.
Starr's side is losing the culture war. Our society is changing rapidly and becoming much more gay friendly. The right wingers know that, which is why they are so freaked. We are going to win in California one way or another -- and sooner rather than later.
