STEP ASIDE, MR. SCALIA...STEP WAY ASIDE

What if a Supreme Court Justice publicly expressed discriminatory opinions against an entire population segment? And what if that same Justice repeatedly voted in a way that would deny that population segment the same rights as other Americans? And most importantly, what if the culture was rapidly changing in favor of the above-mentioned population segment, but the Justice continued to vote in favor of what he has referred to as “rather modest attempt to preserve traditional sexual mores against the efforts of a politically powerful minority."

The very bad news is that there is indeed such a Supreme Court Justice. For those who have not really paid much attention to him, let me introduce Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia (below, left). And that much talked-about population segment? That would be gay Americans, a part of the U.S. citizenry that Scalia has clearly chosen to disenfranchise at every turn. That is why I am using my citizen voice to ask Scalia to recuse himself from the Court’s 2013 votes related to gay rights. I believe Scalia should step aside during these votes based on his unfortunate, discriminatory and fully homophobic past votes on issues related to gay Americans.

 

This year, the Supreme Court is slated to vote on two critical issues related to gay rights -- California's Proposition 8, which bans gay marriage, and a provision of the federal Defense of Marriage Act.  In the first case, the Court will consider the constitutionality, or lack thereof, of California’s Proposition 8, which defines marriage as only between a man and a woman.  The second critical decision will have to do with the Defense of Marriage Act, which also holds that only men and women can marry one another, and that all of the following are not legal for gay couples:  Insurance benefits for government employees, Social Security survivors' benefits, immigration, and the filing of joint tax returns.

For the record, DOMA was signed into law in 1996. These past 17 years have seen more rapid social change regarding gay Americans than in any time in U.S. history. Even the President who signed the bill into law, Bill Clinton, now disagrees with it. So do a number of federal courts that have ruled the bill unconstitutional. DOMA does not really apply to contemporary America. And although 1996 may not seem like such a long time ago, we all know that much has changed since then. So, those “traditional sexual mores” Scalia once referred to are not so traditional anymore.

Here is why Scalia needs to dismiss himself from this debate. First, and most recently, during an appearance before the American Enterprise Institute (a conservative think tank), Scalia, said, “Homosexual sodomy? Come on. For 200 years, it was criminal in every state."  Scalia’s comments are uninformed on two fronts: First, homosexuality is not all about sodomy. Without going into the graphic details, let’s just say that just like heterosexuals, some homosexuals engage in sodomy and some do not. And just like heterosexuals, homosexuals base their loving relationships on a number of human elements, only one of which is sex.  Second, many laws that were enacted 200 years ago no longer apply to the wide population in the U.S. Has Scalia taken a look at copyright laws, for example, since technology wrought online publications?  The “200-year” rule is not a valid argument for discrimination.

Further, in an address to students at Princeton University in December, Scalia said, ““If we cannot have moral feelings against homosexuality, can we have it against murder? Can we have it against other things?” Clearly, Scalia, 77, came of age at a time when World War II had recently ended, and the country was in the throes of true conservatism. There was little or no talk of civil rights, and almost no talk of homosexuality. He was raised in a strict Catholic household, and attended a private Catholic high school.  In a 2010 NY Times article,a high school classmate of Scalia’s said, "This kid was a conservative when he was 17 years old. An archconservative Catholic.” It is the “archconservative” part that matters here, not the “Catholic” part. Believe me, there are plenty of gay Catholic Americans who would jump at the opportunity to get married.

There is a federal statute that governs judicial recusals.  Here is what it says: (a) Any justice, judge, or magistrate judge of the United States shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned. (b) He shall also disqualify himself in the following circumstances: (1) Where he has a personal bias or prejudice concerning a party, or personal knowledge of disputed evidentiary facts concerning the proceeding.”

How much clearer could it be? Scalia is unqualified to rule on issues related to gay rights. I could easily make the case that Scalia is simply too out of touch with contemporary culture and society to rule on these cases, but instead, it is more appropriate to simply label him as unqualified to do so, based on the above-mentioned federal statue. His “impartiality might reasonably be questioned” and he clearly “has a personal bias or prejudice” against the homosexual population in America.

Justice Antonin Scalia needs to recuse himself from both cases that are due to be heard in the Supreme Court this coming Spring.

LOOSE LIPS THAT COULD SINK THE GOP SHIP

Smart citizens aren’t getting too excited one way or the other that a Rick Santorum could triumph in three state primaries on the same night. After all, it’s way early to be getting excited about anybody and the current crop of GOP hopefuls are generally their own worst enemies. After thanking God, family, sky, air, water, or whatever after winning a primary, it seems the following days are full of each of them repeatedly sticking foot in mouth.

Is it just me, or has the GOP primary season run off the rails? Come on. When a candidate looks at the crowd and says there is a link between having an abortion and developing cancer, we know things have gone out of control. Rick Santorum said this after the Komen/Planned Parenthood funding debacle last week. Immediately medical experts came forward to say they knew of no relationship between cancer and abortion. Yet, Santorum clearly felt comfortable saying it.

He’s not the only one whose words are more fantasy than policy, plan or clear intention. Let’s not even go near former hopefuls Herman Cain, Michelle Bachman or Rick Perry. Let’s look at the words of the remaining contenders. Just last week, Mitt Romney (left) said, “I’m not concerned about the very poor that have a safety net, but if it has holes in it, I’ll repair them.” That same week statistics came out that show that my city, New Orleans, has the second highest rate of homelessness in the nation. So I’m wondering, what safety net was he talking about?
It gets worse: Terminally grumpy Newt Gingrich was promoted by a super pac robo-call that said, “Holocaust survivors for the first time were forced to eat non-kosher because Romney thought $5 was too much to pay for your grandparents to eat kosher.” This, of course, was not exactly accurate, but more than that, it is clear evidence of the Gingrich campaign desperately scraping the bottom of the rhetorical barrel for ammunition against the current front runner. He justified the claim by saying Romney has a “lack of concern for religious liberty.” Gingrich denied any knowledge of the robo-call, but he did not dispute what it said.

Meanwhile, Ron Paul(below, right) tells a woman with breast cancer at one of his campaign stops that insurance companies should not have to cover pre-existing conditions. “It’s sort of like me living on the Gulf Coast, not buying insurance until I see the hurricane,” he said. “Insurance is supposed to measure risk.” Paul is the same guy who said this in a recent debate: "I miss the closet. Homosexuals, not to speak of the rest of society, were far better off when social pressure forced them to hide their activities. They could also not be as promiscuous.”

Speaking of gay people, Rick Santorum seems to speak of almost nothing else. Last month he went so far as to say it would be better for a child to have a father in prison than to be raised by lesbian parents. Santorum has made his objection to marriage equality a signature issue in the campaign, while crowds at every campaign stop largely couldn’t care less about who marries who. Yet, he hammers on. Predictably, crowds have taken to challenging Santorum on his views regarding gay Americans. What he has accomplished is simply the engineering of a campaign that is known for its extremism on a subject that Americans find tedious. By the middle of 2011, the Pew Research Institute reported that Americans were almost evenly split on the issue of marriage equality. Pew found that 57 percent of Democrats and 51 percent of independents favored marriage equality, while just one in four Republicans approved.

Santorum is not exactly preaching to the choir. Yet he keeps preaching. Interestingly enough, on the same day Santorum enjoyed the afterglow of his three primary wins, a California appeals court reversed its ruling on Proposition 8, essentially lifting the ban on gay marriage. What this shows is that not only is Santorum out of step with the American public, but he’s beating a dead horse.

Here’s the problem: First, candidates are judged largely by their words and their demeanor. Everything they say on the campaign trail is duly logged for history. Santorum, for example, will almost certainly see marriage equality nationwide during his lifetime, and during his political career. A decade from now the incendiary words he puts forth today will haunt him as pundits hold him to things he said in 2012. As for Gingrich,(left) although this campaign is likely his last hurrah, a man as narcissistic as he surely values his legacy. But what kind of legacy can there really be when he campaigned by calling his opponent (Romney) “despicable,” and when he championed colonizing the moon when right here on earth people were losing their homes and livelihoods in record numbers?

One of my favorite writers, Maya Angelou, says words are actual things. They exist. I always thought of words as simply symbols, but she says they’re real. So, if she’s right, how do any of these men hope to gain the universal respect of the American people when they appear to have no filter when it comes to their own message? And how do they believe Americans will perceive their characters when they do not even deal graciously with one another? Gingrich, for his part, did not even offer the traditional congratulations to Romney, the victor in two recent primaries.

Words count. Manners count. Truth matters. Reasonable discourse attracts citizen support. The old “think before you speak” rule demonstrates intelligence. Why do the GOP candidates this year not get this? Why do they underestimate the citizenry’s collective perceptive nature? If you want to win our support, guys, talk to and with us, and not over and against one another. It’s that simple. Really.

IS THIS THE MOST DANGEROUS MAN IN AMERICA?

This week, in one of his first appearances in New Hampshire, before a group of college students, GOP presidential hopeful Rick Santorum was confronted about his views against marriage equality. Reportedly, he asked the student what the difference would be between allowing two men to get married and allowing more than two men to marry. Essentially, he compared gay Americans getting married to polygamy. This is from a guy who has in the past compared gay people getting married to bestiality and sex between dogs.

Reports are showing up that bigger money is starting to bolster Santorum’s surprisingly emerging candidacy. Just yesterday, Foster Freiss, a megabucks-rich Wyoming financier, revealed that he dropped a half million dollars on Santorum’s Super PAC. This news comes right as it is revealed that Santorum, in a proactive sweep, is planning a major media blitz in South Carolina. While he preps for South Carolina, polls have him pulling up to third in New Hampshire. Meanwhile, he continues his unabashedly bigoted remarks about black Americans, gay Americans, pro-choice Americans, poor Americans, and even Mormons (who he says are members of a dangerous cult”). Rick Santorum is a bigot. Just reading those words right now on the page, I can’t help wondering why I haven’t read them anywhere else. Not only is he a bigot, but he tries mightily to convince you and me that he is not, even backtracking on his own words. Watch:

The ultimate danger is an exclusionary, closed-minded bigot gathering steam in the race to be the leader of the free world. What kind of a world would happen with a President Santorum? I envision a world under Santorum where America is at war with Iran. He has as much as said it. I envision a world in which girls raped by their fathers are forced to give birth; a world in which fully trained doctors in the best medical facilities in the country are legally compelled to allow a woman to die rather than abort the fetus that is killing her. Santorum would even like to legislate sexual behavior between men and women; he recently said contraceptives are “a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be.” His views on contraception are nothing new; they’ve just gotten louder. Here is what he said as far back as 2006:

Those who still remain unconvinced of Santorum’s ignorance should take note of the fact that somehow he speaks of birth control only in terms of pre-marital sex. The truth is it is a multi-faceted, life and death issue. He makes no mention of sexually transmitted diseases, HIV infection, teen pregnancy rates or any other issue associated with a lack of birth control. Again, Santorum’s narrow view of the world ignores inevitable consequences and asks the citizenry to subscribe to his own lack of understanding of vital issues.

Santorum’s rhetoric is positively Bachmannesque in its ignorance, but there is quite a distinction between him and Michele Bachmann. She was a flake who fizzled out of the public’s consciousness faster than you can say “Iowa.” He, on the other hand is rising. By some estimates his support nationwide quintupled after Iowa. He is reported to have raised $2 million in the 48 hours following the caucus there. As the money pours in, Santorum is steadily elevating his rhetorical swagger. On Thursday he actually dissed Ronald Reagan in a speech about social security. Try to remember the last time you heard a GOP candidate who was bold (or stupid) enough to denigrate Reagan. Santorum’s getting perilously cocky.

The danger here is the precedent. If Santorum can rise in America, what ails this country, and what other fringe candidate could garner support? We Americans rarely rally behind extremists who run for president. But people are scared right now. After witnessing the Arab Spring, bloodshed worldwide, the Occupy movement coast to coast – Americans are ripe for a law and order guy. And if the only type of law and order that presents itself is moral law and order in the body of a Rick Santorum, it appears a lot of scared Americans are ready to jump on his highly determined and rigidly conceived bandwagon. He is a man whose rapid ascent is the clear result of national desperation.

That’s no way to elect a president. If I could get one message across to all of those rabid Santorum supporters it would be this: What you are witnessing is the candidacy of an angry man. Inside of his rhetoric is a true rage against freedom. It is the world according to Rick Santorum, and anyone who doesn’t fall in line is simply dismissed and categorized as a sinner.


If you want to witness a teachable moment, this is the big one. Here and now we can learn a lot about what moves people when they’re in trouble. Santorum’s message is resonating among citizens who feel disenfranchised and hopeless. He is playing the God card, and transforming his holier-than-thou attitude into a public rallying cry for his limited version of morality.

Will we buy what he’s selling in the long term? I think not. But plenty of damage can be done in the meantime. As the campaign goes on, attention will likely turn to Santorum’s cozy connections with big business, his uncomfortable alliance with lobbyists, his questionable past business dealings and his hawkish views on foreign policy. But right now, since he seems hell bent on imposing his moral views on America, it’s time for us to ask ourselves if we could truly abide a President who dismisses millions of us simply because we believe in something he does not comprehend – freedom of choice.

"AND A CHILD SHALL LEAD THEM"

Don’t ever discount the collective wisdom of the pre-pubescent crowd. Two kids hit the headlines this week in separate, but equally significant incidents.

First, AOL “Parent Dish” writer Bethany Sanders wrote a piece about a Romona, CA sixth grader who learned firsthand about censorship. Reportedly, student Natalie Jones was to deliver a report to her class about the late Harvey Milk,(right) San Francisco’s first gay elected official. Principal Theresa Grace vetoed the idea, claiming it violated the school’s policy about teaching sexual content. Read all about it here.

I couldn’t help wondering what Ms. Grace is trying to protect her young charges from. From the importance of treating all human beings with respect? From a truly significant moment in the history of the state of California? And I couldn’t help thinking how unfortunate it is that Ms. Grace has reduced a true pioneer, Harvey Milk, to nothing more or less than his sexuality. And of course, being the inveterate letter writer that I am, I fired off a letter this morning to Ms. Grace, saying all of the above, and more.

There are 1,066 miles between Ramona, CA and Denver, CO, but apparently the two cities are light years apart. Last week in Denver, a third grader named Ethan McNamee organized a rally for marriage equality. It seems Ethan has gay neighbors who cannot legally marry, and he sees an injustice that needs to be addressed. TheDenverChannel.com reports that Ethan says, “Everybody is different in a good way.”

Unlike Bethany’s school, Ethan’s school, Montclair Elementary not only supported his efforts, but notified all of the students’ parents in case they would like to attend or get involved. Some of the other kids even helped plan the rally. Watch this:

And yes, in case you’re wondering, I wrote a letter to Ethan, as well, offering him congratulations for the way beyond his years wisdom and commitment. Maybe you should do the same – Ethan McNamee, c/o Montclair Elementary School, 1151 Newport St., Denver, CO 80220