I was browsing at Ace of Spades HQ and a story there by Maetenloch about law enforcement officers harassing photographers caught my eye because it mentions a case about a Maryland man — who lives near me — who is on trial for videotaping his own arrest for speeding on his motorcycle. This is an issue that Instapundit, aka law professor Glenn Reynolds, follows and Maetenloch linked a piece by Prof. Reynolds published at Popular Mechanics a week ago. Here’s what caught my eye (boldfacing mine):

Not surprisingly, police tend to be particularly sensitive about being photographed themselves. And many of the cases cited by Manning involve officers discouraging citizens from filming them while they go about their duties. Though one can understand their skittishness, the fact is, our ability to document the actions of public officials is an important freedom, one that can serve as a check against abuses.

Police and prosecutors in Maryland have been taking a particularly hard line. In one case, motorcycle rider Anthony Graber left his helmet cam on while he was pulled over by a state trooper. A grand jury indicted him on several violations of the state’s wiretapping laws. If convicted on all charges, Graber could face up to 16 years in prison. In alleging that the GoPro video camera on Graber’s helmet constituted a “surreptitious” wiretapping device, prosecutors are making the claim that a person recording his own arrest is violating the police officer’s right to privacy.

This is the sort of thing you might be tempted simply to toss in the crazy file. But, in fact, this is one of the comparatively few issues that could merit a new federal civil rights law. Under the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, Congress is empowered to pass laws protecting civil rights against infringement by state and local officials, and that seems to be what’s happening here. A clear federal law would limit cases, like Maryland’s, in which local officials use their power to harass those who might keep an eye on them. Passing such a law would make us all safer.

So lesbians and gays are supposed to fight state-by-state for equality — which conservatives advocate because they know it will be an exercise in futility — but PHOTOGRAPHERS merit a federal civil rights law? GET IN LINE, PHOTOGRAPHERS!

In the same spirit, I invite GOProud Chair Christopher R. Barron to resign from GOProud for his stupefying failure of vision and leadership in his exhortation this week in The Advocate for gays to abandon the fight for same-sex marriage equality and instead become fiscal conservatives:

While the debate over marriage continues, we as a community should support pragmatic reforms that will reduce discrimination against gay and lesbian couples while at the same time strengthening these systems for all Americans.

It is time for the self-appointed leadership of Gay, Inc. to recognize that with leadership comes responsibility. If you claim to speak for the gay community, if you claim to set the agenda for our community, then you have a requirement to make sure you support legislation and policy initiatives that would improve the lives of gay and lesbian Americans today. It is time to abandon marriage or bust.

No, Mr. Barron, it is NOT time to abandon the quest for same-sex marriage equality. However, it IS time for people of real vision and leadership and courage to point out that EQUALITY for lesbians and gays is indeed a matter of the liberty that conservatives purport to hold sacred and that equality is only real when it is federally guaranteed. Criminy, if the liberty of photographers deserves a federal civil rights law, then the noble aspirations of lesbians and gays to marry, serve in the military, adopt children and to be free of discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodations DESERVES A FEDERAL CIVIL RIGHTS LAW FIRST.

Lesbians and gays are a natural constituency of fiscal conservatism because discrimination forces so many of us to become self-employed as individuals or as small business owners. In addition, we know we cannot look to the government for handouts. There are two reasons that there are not more lesbians and gays who are fiscal conservatives — first, social conservatives use the government to force us into second-class citizenship in a deliberate effort to destroy as many gay and lesbian people as they can, and second, social conservatives drive lesbians and gays out of the conservative movement.

So, rather than calling on gays and lesbians to be second-class citizens in perpetuity and fight for the causes of a movement that intentionally destroys our lives, why not call out the conservative movement and explain how many of our conservative goals of improving the morality of individuals and society will be met by the socializing benefits available only to first-class citizens AND how much easier it will be to get the programs advocated by fiscal conservatives enacted into law AFTER gays and lesbians get a federal civil rights law ensuring our equality. This would gut the Left because it would take from them a constituency whose priorities they have vowed to stall forever and yet who performs prodigious amounts of labor and donates even more prodigious amounts of cash — all in quest of the birthright every other American takes for granted: EQUALITY. Nothing would expose the Left as a fraud faster or more effectively.

Former governor of Arkansas, Mike Huckabee, in an interview at The College of New Jersey, in Ewing, New Jersey, on Friday slandered same-sex marriage in terms that usually get him congratulations from his supporters and indignation from lesbians and gays, which results in more congratulations from his supporters, all of which Huckabee seems to feed on and revel in. However, he is in hot water about it today — calling same-sex marriage comparable to polygamy, incest and bestiality doesn’t seem to be working out as well this time as it has in the past, so Huckabee is trying the time-honored tactic of attacking the student journalist and claiming he was misquoted.

Oops! The student who interviewed him has posted a video of the transcript with the audio of the interview — guess who is the bald-faced liar?:

Original Video – More videos at TinyPic

H/T Good As You, which also has the full quote of Huckabee’s disingenuous attack on the student journalist’s integrity.

Newsmax has a summary of Huckabee’s attacks on same-sex marriage from his interview at The College of New Jersey.

To put in perspective Huckabee’s personal moral sense and his attacks on the integrity of gay people for the BEING crime of homosexuality, it is worth recalling his easy attitude toward the DOING crime of murder that led him — over and over and over again — to grant clemency to Arkansas’s murderers against the advice of pretty much every expert in the Arkansas criminal justice system and the families of the victims. This includes the murderer he released who took the lives four police officers in Washington state in Nov. 2009 — for background, see the Washington Independent and Michelle Malkin.

New gentle readers: for more on my views on same-sex marriage and equality for lesbians and gays, please click those topics in my “Category” list in the sidebar:

• Gay marriage
• Homosexual marriage equality
• Homosexual equality
• Totalitarian social conservatism
• Gay adoption
• Gays in the military, “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”

Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens announced this morning that he will retire from the Supreme Court at the end of its current term in June or June. Justice Stevens began his service on the Supreme Court on Dec. 17, 1975. He will turn 90 on April 20.

Gay rights activists have been passive about the treacheries to their legislative objectives for equality by Obama and the Democrat-controlled Congress. They should have been screaming their heads off, pointing out that blacks and women got equality during the Viet Nam war and assorted economic crises so there’s no time like the present for gay equality, and then stopping all work for and donations to any Democrat until they spent the half hour it would take to pass the required legislation and sign it into law.

Well, while I understand Mark Steyn’s objections to the stamp collection paradigm of diversity, IT IS TIME FOR AN OPENLY LESBIAN OR GAY SUPREME COURT JUSTICE.

So, Democratic gay rights activists — get on that, please. Tell Obama and the Democrats it is put up or shut up time.

Bonus:

Here’s the transcript of Mark Steyn on “The Hugh Hewitt Show” on Thursday, April 8, 2010, making the “stamp collection” remark (boldfacing mine):

HH: Now I also have to bring up the delicious irony that came across my desk today. Asian-American Democrats are criticizing the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee for favoring a white former Congressman from Hawaii over the Asian-American state senate president in a hotly contested special election to represent a majority of a minority Hawaiian district. I had the Republican challenger, Charles Djou on yesterday, www.djou.com, but what do you make of this, Mark Steyn? The Democrats divided, and they’re going with the old, white guy.

MS: Yeah, I know. It’s rather heartening in a way.

HH: Yes, it is.

MS: Frank Rich wrote a ridiculous column, even by his own impressive standards, a couple of weeks ago…

HH: (laughing)

MS: …saying that the only reason guys like me and you oppose Obamacare is because we’re uncomfortable with a black president and a female Speaker, and a wise Latina on the Supreme Court, and gay Barney Frank as a powerful Congressional committee chairman. So it’s good to know that the Democrats are now finding one old, heterosexual, white guy that we can be opposed to as well.

HH: (laughing)

MS: I love it when identity politics starts devouring itself. And I say bring it on.

HH: It is…

MS: I’m tired of identity politics, and I’d rather, you know, I’m interested in individual liberty and rights for individuals. And I can’t stand this kind of stamp collector’s view of diversity, that a modern political movement only counts if it’s got one of everything.

Be sure to read the entire transcript at Radio Blogger.

By the way, I’m not kidding here: IT IS TIME FOR AN OPENLY GAY OR LESBIAN JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT. On account of our stamp being the only one in the collection that does NOT have all those rights for individuals and the liberty that straight people have.

I have a proposal for attracting to conservatism a demographic that’s up-for-grabs. There are three blog publishers who are in a position to do this. Each one could do it alone, but it will make a bigger impact if they hold hands and make the leap of faith together.

My proposal is that at least one publisher of a conservative group blog make their blog a conservative-gay-friendly space by doing the following:

1. Publishing columns that are in favor of homosexual equality by authors who make their case in terms of the values of conservatives, such as liberty, the Constitution, capitalism, strengthening marriage and the family, and so on.
2. Refusing to publish any column, podcast, radio show or TV show expressing opposition to equality for homosexuals.
3. Allowing debate on the merits of homosexual equality in the comments on each piece, but setting a high standard for approving comments by refusing to publish any that are rude or include personal attacks or name-calling.

Hear me out — this is NOT censorship.

After all, regarding item two above — every conservative online publication — and CPAC — has a point-of-view and rejects writers and performers and speakers who oppose it. For example, conservative women do not have to argue with opponents of their equality — and I remember when equality for women WAS controversial. No one gets to advocate white supremacy, or call for a return to the days of segregation. Muslims and anti-semites do not get to argue for the destruction of Israel and of Jews. No one is allowed to claim that Islam is misunderstood by Muslims carrying out its instructions to kill infidels. You don’t get to glorify socialism, fascism, Communism, Leftism, totalitarianism, statism, Hitler, Mussolini, Mao, Stalin, Che, Chavez or Castro.

So there ARE boundaries that it is not considered censorship to enforce.

The first thing establishing this policy will do is create a space that gives lesbian and gay conservatives the dignity of advocating for their own equality instead of only being allowed to fight for the liberty of others because their own cause is too insignificant. After all — Obama, the economy, Iraq, Afghanistan — we have bigger problems. Well, you know what? We figured out how to give blacks and women their equality during the Viet Nam war, Watergate, the oil embargoes, inflation, double-digit interest rates and the Iran hostage crisis. So there’s every reason to get going on the process of equality for homosexuals right now and no excuse for stalling.

Second, such a policy will result in a blog that lesbians and gays could enjoy reading, so they can get acquainted with the ideas of fiscal conservatism in an atmosphere of comparative peace. Discrimination has forced so many lesbians and gays into entrepreneurial careers that they are the natural constituency of fiscal conservatism. Obama and the Democrats have broken their promises to lesbians and gays, who are starting to realize that the Left also has social conservatives — Protestant blacks, Muslims, illegal and legal Catholic immigrants — who are intractably allied AGAINST equality for lesbians and gays. This means lesbians and gays who would be open to conservatism are a demographic up-for-grabs.

So, in the face of such hatred, exploitation and betrayal on the Left, why don’t more lesbians and gays leave?

Lesbians and gays act like battered wives and refuse to leave their abusers because they don’t have any safe place to go. They don’t know that fiscal conservatism is an option as their new home. They don’t know how much the Leftist mainstream media and blogosphere lie to them to keep them in the fold. And all they see of conservatism is social conservatives who demonize them.

But social conservatives do not own every square inch of the conservative movement. And welcoming lesbians and gays does not mean the loss of religion, God and good values. After all, one of the first organizations founded at the dawn of the gay rights movement was the Metropolitan Community Church. And the aspirations of lesbians and gays for equality are noble ones: to marry, to create a family through adoption, and to serve their country in the military with exactly the same openness about their sexual orientation that straights have, along with the same duties.

Finally, setting this policy will take from the Left one of its favorite accusations against conservatives of bigotry. It also will expose the Left’s fraudulent tolerance and real abuse and exploitation of homosexuals. Imagine the contortions of deception that Obama and the Democrats will be forced into in order to halt the stampede of their gay cash cows! Obama might even have to keep a promise!!!!!11!!!!1!!!! Seriously, isn’t it worth doing for that alone?

Dear gentle readers, what do you think of this proposal?

Update, 4/6/2010, Tues.: Woohoo! This post has been linked by Queerty! There was a bit of snark and a touch of doubt that I am in my right mind, as evidenced by my refusal to accept the religion of anthropogenic global warming, rebranded as climate change, just because the scientific evidence doesn’t support the theory. However, basically the post was fair, so good on them for that. There were exploding heads in the comments, but that is par for the course.

Anyway, Queerty readers, there ARE plenty of people on the Right who DO support gay equality and we are grabbing that issue and running with it. We are going to expose the lies of Democrats, who say they are helpless to keep their promises to gays because of all the bigots on the Right. Yo, yo, yo! Leftist gays and lesbians! Your problem is bigots on the Left! Democrats control the Congress and White House — if you do not hold their feet to the fire and set a deadline like July 4 to get the legislation for our equality passed and signed into law, you are making the mistake of a lifetime! Do NOT give another penny to the Democrats or one second of your labor until that happens. No excuses. No delays. No “we’ve got bigger problems.”

The Democrats are abusing you and laughing at you because they think they’ve got you trapped. Well, fiscal conservatism is a much nicer world than Leftism and is ready to welcome you with open arms. Keep coming back and I will explain why and how. In the meantime, the more Obama/Pelosi/Reid see that you WILL leave for a better offer and you HAVE one, the more leverage you have. Take it. Use it. And be prepared for the possibility that finally making the Democrats put up or shut up will reveal that they have practiced a mind-boggling deception on you for their own selfish ends.

H/T Bookworm Room

This video actually is an amazingly good summary of the melting of the anthropogenic global warming hoax now re-branded as “climate change,” which seems like a safe enough position to hold since change is what the climate does all the time.

I have pretty much recovered from shoveling the record snowfalls we received here in northern Maryland. About all I’ve done this month is prepare for, deal with and recover from the snowfalls. I have a lot of things to catch up on. I haven’t finished working my way through all the comments that accumulated while I was too tired/sore to deal with them. In addition, I wanted to write a post explaining my objections to Gay Patriot and various positions taken by Daniel Blatt, but CPAC starts on Thursday and goes until Saturday evening, Feb. 18-20. I have to prepare for that so it looks like I won’t be able to get that done until after CPAC. I see from the comments to my post on Gay Patriot West that Gay Patriot, Bruce, the founder of the blog, is irritated with me, too. I know Bruce and I are scheduled to be in at least one meeting together, pre-CPAC on Wednesday. This is a discussion that SHOULD be taking place in the open between our blogs. I intend to continue it.

And really — how is it possible there are gay men who have NOT had an outraged lesbian grab them by the shoulders, rant at them, and shake them until they rattle in order to raise their consciousness on some issue? It’s. What. We. DO!

However, I do want to note how much the reactions of Gay Patriot (Bruce) and Gay Patriot West (Daniel Blatt) contrast sharply with those of Stacy McCain, my dear friend and frequent antagonist on the issues of homosexual equality, gay marriage and feminism. Really, click my categories “Stacy McCain of The Other McCain,” and “Robert Stacy McCain” and see what a true professional and good sport he is. It won’t be hard to figure out why I stick up for Stacy, regardless of our opposition on issues we each hold so close to our hearts.

By the way, I plan never to have a public fight with Hill Buzz because our communication is excellent so I would never have to, I adore the Hill Buzz boys, we’ve been supportive of one another from the get-go, and when they criticize the gay community, they do it pretty much from the same place I do — it’s regarding specific people from their past or present. Also, when Kevin, et al., write, they unite reason, love, passion, duty and a fine sense of right and wrong. Their posts always are worth reading because I always learn something I didn’t know and wanted to learn, or my heart is warmed or I get a laugh — like their post today on the meltdown of the religion of anthropogenic global warming with a funny illustration featuring Al Gore.

For my dear gentle readers who are concerned about my father, my awesome nephew will be looking after him when I am in Washington, D.C., at CPAC, assisted by our kitties.

John Aravosis at Americablog summarizes Obama’s broken promises — aka lies — to the gay and lesbian community about supporting homosexual equality, repealing the Defense of Marriage Act and “don’t ask, don’t tell,” which would take half an hour tops for the Democratic-majority Congress to pass and messenger to Obama to sign. If, say, they really wanted to. Which they don’t. And never will:

But today [9/3/09] we have word from the Democrats that this year is a bad time to lift the ban on gays in the military, and next year won’t work because — as Joe and I predicted repeatedly — it’s a congressional election year, and keeping the Democrats’ civil rights promises may anger the religious right (duh), the Dems are now telling us. So the next two years won’t work for Don’t Ask Don’t Tell (and apparently any other gay rights promise). Of course, that means that the next year, 2011, won’t work either, because it is the beginnings of the presidential primaries, and the year after that won’t work, 2012, since it’s a presidential election year and a congressional election year.

That means that the President and the Congress might keep the civil rights promises to tens of millions of gay and lesbian Americans some time in 2013, assuming Obama wins re-election or another Democrat takes his place. That of course assume that we aren’t facing another economic crisis, or are fighting a war, or have the need to pass some other large piece of legislation — then the gays may have to wait until 2017, provided another Democrat wins the presidency, and the nation has no other important issues to address for a while.

Are there THAT many lesbians and gays who NEVER lied to get laid that they don’t realize what happened to them last November?

So, lesbians and gays, the more of you who realize the Left just wants you as slaves and ornaments and cash cows, the better, and sooner, rather than later. The Right respects individuality AND has this nice big tent just waiting for you to move in and make it FABULOUS.

P.S.

Your first clue that Obama would never keep any promises to the gay and lesbian community was the revelation n March 2008 that he’d spent 20  years in Rev. Wright’s church — his first allegiance is to anti-gay black ministers and their congregations. Listen to Al Sharpton more carefully and you’ll see he’s disappearing all the colors of the Rainbow Coalition but his own. Read up a little on Black Liberation Theology.

Next in importance is Obama’s allegiance to Muslims and illegal immigrants, who bring the double whammy of being anti-gay and predominantly coming from cultures that regard women as property. There are more of them than there are of you, so your priorities always will be pushed to the indefinite future. That way Obama and the Democrats can continue to exploit you forever while deceiving you into believing you have nowhere else to go. Well, you do! Seriously, stop behaving like battered spouses — just drop off the key, Lee, and get yourself free.

Because your/our real problem is that in a democracy, these three constituencies that really matter to Obama all want us dead, never mind about blocking or rolling back our civil rights. If Obama gets his open-borders immigration “reform” bill passed, he will vastly increase the number of voters who want homosexuals dead and then he won’t need you any more and under the bus you will go.

In contrast, conservatism is your safe house and battered spouse shelter. Conservatives understand marriage and mostly want to know you’ll treat the institution well and not try to change their religions, which is fair enough. Conservatives also love service to our country in the military and they love the people who want to serve — mostly they want to know you’ll do right by the military, too. These are reasonable standards to meet. And they can be met in the near future — and when they are, I think it is conservatives who will fight for homosexual equality and pass the laws needed to make it happen. After all, it is Republican Colin Powell who is calling for an end to “don’t ask, don’t tell,” and Republican Dick Cheney who publicly supports homosexual marriage equality — which Obama even more publicly opposes.

Come to the conservative safe house. You don’t have to be battered and exploited any more.

Over the last year I’ve started to see the Democratic party as an organization that makes promises to idealistic people that it doesn’t intend to keep in order to get their support. Now I’m not surprised that I couldn’t cash in any Democrat/liberal promises like wheelchair access to an annual lesbian event for my life partner that was run by — I am not making this up — prominent lesbian disabled rights activists.

Also over the last year I’ve learned how much fiscal conservatism and the Republican party are about liberty and individual empowerment. And in one or two of my early posts on this blog, I predicted that it is Republicans who understand marriage and who would be the ones who would enact laws for marriage equality for lesbians and gays.

So I’m really not surprised at all that Republican Eric Brescia, who is running for the House of Delegates in Virginia, says that it is because of his Republican values that he supports changes in Virginia law described here in support of homosexual equality.

Oh, and while I’m not surprised, I am really, REALLY glad.

moar funny pictures

Obama, as a man without a conscience — that is, a sociopath — whose overriding goal in life is to dominate everyone and everything, who does not have the ability to feel empathy and whose cool, calm demeanor is based on the fact that there are very few emotions that sociopaths genuinely have — will tell any lie to get his way. There is no such thing as a lie Obama will not tell — quick, what’s his latest position on Gitmo? on gay rights? Besides his sociopathy, another reason Obama holds so many mutually exclusive positions simultaneously, or in rapid sequence, is that prospective opponents tune out once they hear him say what they want to hear. So a lot of his supporters have no idea that he has made so many promises that are impossible to keep. In addition, Obama does not worry about ever keeping a promise because he is supremely confident in his ability to destroy anyone who insists that he does.

However, I believe I have discovered Obama’s Achilles heel. Recently I noticed that there’s a pattern to Obama’s prevarications that I believe will allow Republicans and conservatives to predict his next lie approximately two-to-three days before he tells it. Understanding this pattern will allow Republicans and conservatives to conserve energy and resources in the fight against Obama’s campaign to destroy the U.S. economy with debt, tax, regulation and entitlement bombs because they will know where to head him off at the pass and can have welcoming committees ready and waiting to, uh — “ambush” sounds so unfriendly — greet him appropriately when he arrives.

It’s really so simple! The Obama Prevarication Predictor Principle is that Obama’s next Big Lie will target any consensus that would thwart one of his objectives. The content of the Big Lie will be to seek to destroy the consensus. So the Big Lie will assert that whatever people are objecting to won’t be proposed, or won’t happen, or is not a “must have.” It will always seem very accommodating.

The actual result will be along the lines of Obama’s recent bamboozling of his gay supporters when they got uppity over all his broken promises about repealing DOMA and DADT and stopped their campaign donations. He quickly arranged a sham accommodation by having his minions trumpet a long list of coveted rights Obama would grant to same-sex partners of federal employees. The gay lobby still really hasn’t caught on that Obama’s presidential memorandum included the stipulation that it would comply with DOMA, which negates almost everything Obama’s initial pronouncements claimed his memorandum would allow. But most gays were only paying attention to the promises and won’t find out Obama’s promises can’t be honored until they try to cash them in. Meanwhile, Obama shattered their consensus and duped them back into the fold.

My prediction for Obama’s Big Lie in his address to the nation tonight is based on House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s statement yesterday that Congress may adjourn on August 7 without having passed Obama’s healthcare reform bill along with signs of doubts from erstwhile Democratic true believers. So I predict Obama’s Big Lie will be that the time for talk is over so healthcare reform bill must be passed in a big hurry, fast, fast, fast, don’t bother to read it, just do it now!

P.S.

Over at National Review Online, Jim Geraghty made a related point when he wrote that all of Obama’s promises have an expiration date.

UPDATE: I watched Obama’s press conference and he went full-spectrum in the not-credible-promise department. Summary version: our current government-run health insurance programs, Medicare and Medicaid, are breaking our budget, so the solution is to have MORE government-run healthcare. Also, Congress must pass the healthcare reform bill by his arbitrary deadline because if they don’t, we’ll never have healthcare reform. AND, he promises, if they pass something, anything, he won’t sign it if it has (insert any of the current objections to healthcare reform).

Is it just me — and I really have only heard about this phenomenon — but isn’t Obama’s promise that he won’t sign the healthcare reform bill if it adds to the deficit, or whatever is the obstacle du jour, EXACTLY the same as a man in a moment of intimacy promising a woman that if she will just let him put it in, he won’t do anything else? And — help me out here — doesn’t the man make this promise trusting that once it is in, the woman will change her mind? So the whole premise of the promise is an intention to deceive?

Also, why is no one calling Obama for laziness and stupidity for his two arguments that (1) if there’s an expensive blue pill and a cheaper red pill that do the same thing, we should only buy the red pill?, and (2), we need to develop more of a consensus on what works and what doesn’t? These two points are stupid because (1), limiting the formulary and requiring people to use generic medications are two of the first reforms that were implemented in the 1990′s, and (2), the entire medical field ALREADY is dedicated to figuring out what works and what doesn’t — that is what research and medical journals DO.

What Obama showed in this press conference is that he can barely be bothered to memorize statistics to offer as proof of his assertions — assuming he has the intellectual capacity, which I doubt. And he is too lazy to bother to master any of the basics of healthcare reform. I am flabbergasted ANYONE thinks he is smart man, rather than just a cunning one.

As soon as I knew about Obama’s 20-year allegiance to his pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, his Muslim up-bringing in Indonesia, his ties to the Muslim world and his support of illegal immigration — all groups that hate homosexuals and most of whom feel entitled to kill us, and some of whom believe they are obligated to do so — I knew that none of his promises of support to the gay community could be true. He would take our money and our work and our votes, then oppose our equality to appease these groups — the ones he really supports.

Through Instapundit’s link to AMERICAblog today, I learned that Obama has filed a brief in support of the Defense of Marriage Act in Smelt v. USA that is the most devastating attack on the movement of equality for lesbians and gays ever. AMERICAblog analyzes the brief and explains its consequences here. They are wrong about one thing, though: George W. Bush advanced homosexual equality when he signed the Worker, Retiree and Employer Recovery Act of 2008 (WRERA), which makes it mandatory for an employer to roll over retirement benefits to a same-sex partner in the event of an employee’s death. GayAgenda explains:

Prior to the law, employers could decline the benefit and surviving same-sex partners would have to pay an inheritance tax on the deceased partner’s retirement savings. As you know, legally married heterosexual couples automatically avoid that tax penalty.

For more about WRERA, see Gay Patriot here.

BTW, the most heart-felt praise and gratitude expressed toward Pres. Bush that I read during his final days in office were from the gay centrist Democrats at HillBuzz here.

Obama’s Motion to Dismiss Marriage case

Towleroad has more (but really, guys, white type on black IS HARD TO READ!).

P.S.

This is different than the case fighting for marriage equality for homosexuals filed by the Bush v. Gore attorneys, Theodore Olson, a conservative, and David Boies, a liberal. They filed Perry v. Schwarzenegger in federal court in May with the intent of taking the case before the U.S. Supreme Court. I described that case and gave a link to the brief here.

Thank you, Attila, dear: See “Obama Throws Gays/Lesbians Way, Way Under the Bus.”

P.P.S.

see more Funny Graphs

Cynthia Yockey with Joe the Plumber on Feb. 26, 2009, at CPAC in Washington, D.C.

I have Charles Johnson’s blog, Little Green Footballs, in my newsfeed (look right) so that it is easy for me to keep an eye on his coverage of Creationism and Intelligent Design. As it happens, I have original correspondence and drafts supporting his recent denunciation of Melanie Phillips’ column in favor of Intelligent Design, which truly is re-branded religion, but he won’t have anything to do with me, which I assume is because it was my father’s work that was appropriated and distorted to start the Intelligent Design bushwa in the first place in spite of his explicit opposition. (My father is Hubert P. Yockey, for more info see the blog I started for him at www.hubertpyockey.com.) Oh, well, Charles, my door is open if you ever want to talk.

However, because I keep an eye on Charles and LGF, I found out about Joe the Plumber weighing in on the controversy on gay marriage this week in a post titled “Joe the Plumber speaks out against ‘Queers.’ “ Joe said:

I’ve had some friends that are actually homosexual. And, I mean, they know where I stand, and they know that I wouldn’t have them anywhere near my children. But at the same time, they’re people, and they’re going to do their thing.

I boldfaced the “area of concern,” as Rachel Lucas would say.

When I met Joe at CPAC, he was very kind and told me he enjoyed the remarks I made at the first Conservatism 2.0 meeting. His publisher’s booth was near Blogger’s Row and when I stopped to buy his book, Joe remembered me and made a point of searching out a copy he had not yet signed so he could do a special autograph for me. I do love the man and his do-right character. He is working hard to educate himself on the issues, which I respect. I am shocked that more hasn’t been done by the Republican Party and/or conservative organizations to bring him on board in a salaried position and get him up to speed. I think he has the potential to be an asset for the long haul.

I believe one day, because Joe is a “do right” man with an intelligent mind and a warm, valiant heart, he will see lesbians and gays as individuals when he is deciding whether we are suitable company for his children and make his decision on the basis of each individual’s character. Perhaps Joe will be like the TV character Andy Sipowicz from NYPD Blue, who was worried about letting his squad’s administrative assistant, whom he called “Gay John,” babysit for his young son. He asked around the squad and got good character references for John, and then did allow him to babysit because AS AN INDIVIDUAL, John was a good man who would never harm a child.

In real life, lesbians and gays may actually be better to children than straight people. We set up organizations to help teens who are homeless because their parents threw them out when they found out they were gay. We also adopt the children straight people have thrown away. We work for the right to adopt because the joys and challenges of raising children enrich one’s life. (I notice some religions seem to encourage their members to adopt in an effort to increase their numbers and their church’s power and wealth. However, there is no corollary motive for gays — we do not adopt for the purpose of increasing the numbers and power of the gay rights movement. ) Also, when we have life partners who have children, when we can be their children’s adoptive parents then the children have more security for life because they have another parent legally committed to them. And also, then we can pick the children up from school, manage their medical care and transport the children without risking being detained by police until our status in their life can be determined.

So, Joe, one day I hope you know enough about life, about people and about lesbians and gays to make decisions on us as individuals. However, until then, it’s over between you and me.

Update: I am so grateful to find this comment about Joe the Plumber’s anti-gay remark from Roger Simon, founder of Pajamas Media.