Gay Judge Vaughn Walker’s Ruling…..Some Excerpts

From Ashby Jones at the Wall Street Journal:

“Judge Vaughn Walker’s opinion in the Proposition 8 case is not short, clocking in at 136 pages. For now, here are some highlights, most of which come deep in the opinion, starting at about page 85.

• Proposition 8 places the force of law behind stigmas against gays and lesbians, including: gays and lesbians do not have intimate relationships similar to heterosexual couples; gays and lesbians are not as good as heterosexuals; and gay and lesbian relationships do not deserve the full recognition of society. (Page 85)

• Proposition 8 has had a negative fiscal impact on California and local governments. (Page 90)

• Proposition 8 increases costs and decreases wealth for same sex couples because of increased tax burdens, decreased availability of health insurance and higher transactions costs to secure rights and obligations typically associated with marriage. Domestic partnership reduces but does not eliminate
  these costs. (Page 91)

• Proposition 8 singles out gays and lesbians and legitimates their unequal treatment. Proposition 8 perpetuates the stereotype that gays and lesbians are incapable of forming long-term loving relationships and that gays and lesbians are not good parents. (Page 93)

• Children raised by gay or lesbian parents are as likely as children raised by heterosexual parents to be healthy, successful and well-adjusted. The research supporting this conclusion is accepted beyond serious debate in the field of developmental psychology. (Page 95)

• The Proposition 8 campaign relied on fears that children exposed to the concept of same-sex marriage may become gay or lesbian. The reason children need to be protected from same-sex
  marriage was never articulated in official campaign advertisements. Nevertheless, the advertisements insinuated that learning about same-sex marriage could make a child gay or lesbian and that parents should dread having a gay or lesbian child. (Page 105)

• Relative gender composition aside, same-sex couples are situated identically to opposite-sex couples in terms of their ability to perform the rights and obligations of marriage under California law. Gender no longer forms an essential part of marriage; marriage under law is a union of
  equals. (Page 113)

• Having considered the evidence, the relationship between sex and sexual orientation and the fact that Proposition 8 eliminates a right only a gay man or a lesbian would exercise, the court determines that plaintiffs’ equal protection claim is based on sexual orientation, but this claim is equivalent
  to a claim of discrimination based on sex. (Page 121)

• Proposition 8 . . . enshrines in the California Constitution a gender restriction that the evidence shows to be nothing more than an artifact of a foregone notion that men and women fulfill different roles in civic life.

• The evidence shows that the state advances nothing when it adheres to the tradition of excluding same-sex couples from marriage. Proponents’ asserted state interests in tradition are nothing more than tautologies.

• In the absence of a rational basis, what remains of proponents’ case is an inference, amply supported by evidence in the record, that Proposition 8 was premised on the belief that same-sex couples simply are not as good as opposite-sex couples. Whether that belief is based on moral disapproval of homosexuality, animus towards gays and lesbians or simply a belief that a relationship between a man and a woman is inherently better than a relationship between two men or two women, this belief is not a proper basis on which to legislate.”

Comment:  This judge being gay should have recused himself from the case.  The assumption that heterosexuals all carry animus toward gays is utter nonsense.   As with the American black the gay mind is crippled by his deep belief in his victimhood status.

A Look at the Redefining of Marriage Ruling by Openly Gay Judge Walker

Patrick McIllheran writes at Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel On Line a bit of clarity on the matter:

“Let’s look at how the gay-marriage thing in California has unfolded so far:

The state’s Supreme Court in 2008, on a one-vote margin, decides to redefine marriage to dump one key parameter that had always and everywhere in human history been part of marriage: that it be between complementary sexes, not identical ones.

Within months, the voters of the state overrule the court, amending their constitution to say that, no, you can’t redefine basic social institutions against the will of the people. The losers sue the state.

And Wednesday, a federal judge – a judge, as in one – overrules the people, ruling, among other things, that “gender no longer forms an essential part of marriage.” It doesn’t?

Gay “marriage” advocates cheered, of course, saying it’s a great advance for equality. Ask yourself, however, this: What changed, precisely, because of the decision (presume, for a moment, that all appeals courts agree with Judge Vaughn Walker).

Does this, as gay “marriage” advocates often say, remove some impediment to their preferred relationships?

No, it doesn’t. The fight isn’t about the freedom to love, since the law says nothing (nor should it) about who can love whom, a fundamentally private matter.

Does this change practicalities, such as the right to co-own a house or leave legacies to a gay lover?

No, it does not. Even in places that, like Wisconsin, have not redefined marriage, one may make wills, mortgages, adoptions, benefits arrangements and the like with whom one wants. For its part, California had civil unions carrying all the  benefits of marriage.

Does this alter the ability to a couple to tell each other they’ll be faithful unto death, of one flesh, as married couples (ideally) do?

No. People have always been able to say and mean whatever they wish to each other. Again, the law has no say in such private matters.

Does this allow gay couples to be regarded as if they were married by friends? Does it allow acquaintances to think of long-time lovers as being married?

Again, no. People have long done this, and some churches have long been blessing such couples. That’s their right, of course. They require no judge to do so.

Does this mean that everyone else, including especially perfect strangers, must also now grant gay relationships the same unique and special public respect that until now society has always and everywhere reserved for married couples?

Yes, it does. That’s what the decision was exactly about: Commanding society to view homosexual relationships with a favor that society has been unwilling to grant.

Don’t take my word: As the New York Times explained it, gay-rights activists have increasingly sought same-sex marriage not simply to “lessen discrimination” but also as “an emotional indicator of legitimacy.” The paper quoted one activist as saying that to not redefined marriage “is to deny respect for the essence of who we are as gay people.”

Which is why the state’s civil unions, which conferred the practical benefits of marriage, weren’t enough: They sealed the relationship privately, while only marriage itself could mandate public approbation.

Gay-marriage backers constantly mock an idea they cannot grasp, that redefining marriage will damage it. What – they say – suddenly you’ll love your wife less? Obviously not, but as established a few paragraphs back, marriage isn’t a private affair. Its strength as a social institution – as the relationship at the core of the family – has certainly been damaged, too, by the explosion in divorce, but that’s no reason, either, to euthanize the whole thing.

The reason gay “marriage” damages marriage is not because it changes individual couple’s relationships but because it commands us all to accord as much respect to homosexual relations as society always has done to genuine marriage. Insofar as many people, by their own varied moral reasoning, freely choose to see homosexual relationships as somehow disordered, they will respond to this mandate, then, by according less respect to traditional marriage.

Early research shows this is how it actually works, just as easy divorce, while not necessarily changing any individual couple’s relationship, nonetheless reduces the social expectation that marriage is permanent. If marriage often amounts to a temporary thing, then people see it so even when it comes to couples who seek permanence.

If this is so (and I think the evidence shows it is), then Judge Walker’s decision will have won for gay couples an “emotional indicator” of a “legitimacy” that will rapidly diminish to meaninglessness.

Meanwhile: Paul Mirengoff sees collateral damage:

“Judge Walker’s decision is the fruit of a lengthy process through which an eilite within the legal profession has worked tirelessly in an effort to blur, hopelessly, the distinction between the law and personal preferences of that elite. If the decision stands, its main impact will be a diminution, probably past the tipping point, of public confidence in the law and the courts.”

And: Orin Kerr at Volokh sees Walker as having missed entirely the rationality is society not wanting to have too-rapid change imposed on it.

And: Kathryn Jean Lopez talks to Dan Brown of the National Organization for Marriage, who tells of the violence and hate that defenders of traditional marriage have encountered. He outlines what’s at stake:

“Gay marriage has consequences. The goal of this movement is to use the law to reshape the culture so that disagreement with their views on sex and marriage gets stigmatized and repressed like bigotry. Children will be taught, whether parents like it or not, that traditional faith communities’ views on marriage are based on hatred and bigotry. In the new America they are attempting to build, core civil rights will be sacrificed for imaginary ones that will then be used to exclude most religious people and institutions from the public square. We are already seeing the beginnings of this great purge in the academy, and it will march from there through professional licensing and institutions in ways that will affect a great many people.”

Franken, Minnesota’s Star of the North, Stars as a Fool Again

Alexander Bolton of  “the Hill” picked up Al Franken at boy play on the Senate floor.  C-SPAN chose not to notice boy Franken at play…..the Star of our North.

“Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) scolded Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) on the Senate floor Thursday for allegedly mocking him while he delivered a solemn speech on Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan.

The dust-up came seconds after McConnell delivered a speech on Kagan’s nomination shortly before the Senate voted to confirm her to the high court.

Franken, who was presiding over the chamber from the dais, gesticulated and made faces while McConnell explained his opposition to Kagan, according to witnesses.

The television cameras broadcasting the speech on C-SPAN remained fixed on McConnell, missing Franken’s antics from the Senate president’s chair.

McConnell grew increasingly angry as Franken made fun of him before a crowded public gallery and Senate aides lining the chamber walls. Senate aides said they were shocked that Franken would flout the decorum of the chamber during such a solemn occasion.

After McConnell finished his remarks, he walked up to the dais and rebuked him.

“This is not ‘Saturday Night Live,’ Al,” McConnell said, making reference to Franken’s career as a writer and actor on NBC’s long-running comedy show, according to a witness who overheard the exchange.

After the vote, Franken walked to McConnell’s office to apologize but couldn’t find him. He has sent a personal note, instead.

“The Leader thought I was disrespectful while he was giving his speech on General Kagan,” Franken said in a statement to The Hill. “He is entitled to give his speech with the presiding officer just listening respectfully.  I went directly to his office after I was done presiding to apologize in person.  He wasn’t there, so I’ve sent him a handwritten note.”

Franken, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, voted for Kagan. Thirty-six Republicans, including McConnell, voted against her.”

Comment:  Another anti-American Marxist has risen to the heights of power.

More Government Dictate with Gay “Marriage” Ruling

The following article was found yesterday at realclearpolitics in response to the decision by gay judge, Vaughn Walker to redefine, perhaps destroy marriage:

“It is hard to overstate the significance of the ruling. For the first time in the nation’s history, a federal judge has identified a right under both the equal protection and due process clauses of the federal Constitution that precludes a state from banning same-sex marriages. Just six years after Massachusetts charted its own course and recognized same-sex marriage on a state level, the matter is now squarely before the nation’s judiciary. Within a decade the whole matter might be resolved. And all those people (like me) who blasted the dream team of Boies and Olson for rushing into this case before America was ready for it now are left to wonder what they missed.

Walker’s opinion was detailed, intense and relentless in its rejection of the arguments offered by proponents of Proposition 8. For example, the crucial “findings of fact” contained in the ruling roll on for more than 40 pages; a paean to the dogged work of Boies and Olson and a vitiation of many of the beliefs and prejudices held by so many in and out of California when it comes to same-sex marriage. During the trial, Walker practically begged and cajoled the Prop 8 lawyers to do better for their cause. He asked them written questions to draw them out. He scolded them during closing arguments to make more persuasive arguments. They simply didn’t or couldn’t or wouldn’t respond. And so, based on the evidence at trial, Judge Walker found:

1. “Individuals do not generally choose their sexual orientation. No credible evidence supports a finding that an individual may, through conscious decision, therapeutic intervention or any other method, change his or her sexual orientation.”

2. “California has no interest in asking gays and lesbians to change their sexual orientation or in reducing the number of gays and lesbians in California.”

3. “Same-sex couples are identical to opposite-sex couples in the characteristics relevant to the ability to form successful marital unions. Like opposite-sex couples, same-sex couples have happy, satisfying relationships and form deep emotional bonds and strong commitments to their partners.”

4. “Marrying a person of the opposite sex is an unrealistic option for gay and lesbian individuals.”

5. “The availability of domestic partnership does not provide gays and lesbians with a status equivalent to marriage because the cultural meaning of marriage and its associated benefits are intentionally withheld from same-sex couples in domestic partnerships.”

6. “Permitting same-sex couples to marry will not affect the number of opposite-sex couples who marry, divorce, cohabit, have children outside of marriage or otherwise affect the stability of opposite-sex marriages.”

7. “Proposition 8 places the force of law behind stigmas against gays and lesbians, including: gays and lesbians do not have intimate relationships similar to heterosexual couples; gays and lesbians are not as good as heterosexuals; and gay and lesbian relationships do not deserve the full recognition of society.”

8. “Proposition 8 increases costs and decreases wealth for same sex couples because of increased tax burdens, decreased availability of health insurance and higher transactions costs to secure rights and obligations typically associated with marriage.”

9. “Proposition 8 singles out gays and lesbians and legitimates their unequal treatment. Proposition 8 perpetuates the stereotype that gays and lesbians are incapable of forming long-term loving relationships and that gays and lesbians are not good parents.”

10. “The gender of a child’s parent is not a factor in a child’s adjustment. The sexual orientation of an individual does not determine whether that individual can be a good parent. Children raised by gay or lesbian parents are as likely as children raised by heterosexual parents to be healthy, successful and well-adjusted.”

Even if the appellate courts ultimately find that Walker got his legal analysis wrong, they cannot wash away what same-sex marriage proponents surely will call these 10 “points of light.” Based upon those findings — based upon the utter lack of a rebuttal by opponents of same-sex marriage — Walker concluded that Prop 8 was so blatantly unconstitutional that it could not pass muster under any of the relevant legal standards that judges routinely apply in these cases — even the one called “rational basis,” which is a very low bar indeed. This was a rout, in other words, and there is virtually nothing in the language of Walker’s ruling that suggests otherwise.

Comment:  The concept of  “civil rights” is becoming more ugly as the world become more Marxist.  The European Union just declared “travel” as a human ‘right’, because these lefties believe it is a violation of human decency  to not take time off to see the sights.

This is the world the Obama left.  His royal highness knows best how we should live our lives.

Gay Judge Rules for Gay Marriage…..Surprise!

Gays have an inherent  right to marry, the gay judge judged.  

No they don’t.   Human behavior through the millenia suggest they don’t.

Do they have a right to live together?  At a certain age, of course.  Do they have a right to share a bank account?  To will ones treasure to the other?  Of course, we  should have such a legal right if that is our wish. 

Should gays or lesbians have rights equal to heterosexual couples who legally unite in marriage?

Not in a healthy society, but in the ideal  society an adult male or adult female  does have a entirely appropriate claim in a democratic society to enter a legal union with another of the same sex, but it must not be called marriage.  It must be slightly distinct from marriage.  

Sorry,  you university poisoned…….there are major differences between the human male and the human female besides those determined  by socialization.  As Dennis Prager so often remarks, “One would have to go to graduate school to believe otherwise.”  

Two females  or two males as “parents” are erzatz to the normal.  Never should the playing field be the same between the real and the erzatz when it comes to adopting children. 

Yes, it is possible that two women or two men could raise a family adequately….even successfully.  And it is possible that when the ugly smoke from gay protests blow away the homosexual pair might discover that the human mother is female and the human father is male. 

Even though it no longer is in vogue, an adult society should always be gravely concerned about  and deeply involved in  the the raising of the country’s children.  What kind of adult citizen is to be developed?  What values?  What will be respected?  Will the nation’s children know who they are? What to value?….What to learn?

On the other hand we could  return to group living ……. or start a new industry such as  a rent-a-mother, or rent-a-father.   We are are a creative animal, we humans.

We already have an over feminized society…especially affecting the human male negatively.  Today’s Democrat Party is an excellent example of what results politically when feelings triumph over knowledge and intellectual and physical  problem solving.   Our schools are feminized  making tomorrow’s America even more incapable of coming to decisions beyond feelings and hysteria, the drive that swept the inept and inexperienced Barack Hussein Obama into office.

If a society can be over masculinized as it is in black culture of the inner American city and in the Arab world, it certainly can become over feminized as it has come to paralyze  2010  America. Leftwing propagandists don’t allow such a condition to be discussed.  They prefer it remain ‘unknown’.

Once again as with Roe vs. Wade and the abortion fraud, the will of the people is betrayed by those crippled by the feelings of a judge or two.   These dictators violate the core of democracy.

For the past 50 years the American left wing led by Teddy Kennedy has managed to pocket the courts as well as the democratic process.

I pray the Supreme Court, that is  Judge Kennedy, will support America’s democratic rights and slap down this Gay judge’s whim.

When the evidence for and against Proposition 8 is examined in detail, it becomes obvious just how little reason there was to single out gay and lesbian couples as the only ones to be barred from marrying. That kind of examination never took place during the bitter, frenzied 2008 campaign on the initiative. But this year, U.S. District Chief Judge Vaughn R. Walker conducted a far more thoughtful inquiry during the federal trial challenging the measure. As a result, his decision Wednesday was not only welcome, but unsurprising.

Proposition 8 “fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license,” Walker wrote in his opinion. “Indeed, evidence shows Proposition 8 does nothing more than enshrine in the California Constitution the notion that opposite-sex couples are superior to same-sex couples.”

Judicial activism? Hardly. Walker’s opinion was based on the evidence presented during the trial — including the testimony of witnesses who supported the ban on same-sex marriage. They tried to defend it as rational by arguing that it would protect traditional marriage from harm, that children are better off when raised by a mother and father, and that marriage exists for “responsible procreation.”

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Those arguments fell apart when a witness in favor of Proposition 8 could articulate no ways in which same-sex marriage would affect heterosexual marriages. Even if heterosexual couples make better parents — and there is ample evidence that this isn’t so — society does not try to strip marriage rights from the ones who make bad parents. Nor does society forbid the marriages of the many heterosexual couples who either cannot or choose not to have children.

In his ruling, Walker said that a key witness presented none of the credible evidence against same-sex marriage that had been promised, and that when the witness was asked about evidence demonstrating the state’s interest in procreation through marriage, he replied: “You don’t have to have evidence of this point.” The case almost certainly will be appealed all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

We strenuously hope that Walker’s decision will be upheld by the high court. But no matter what happens, the trial in San Francisco delivered an unforgettable lesson in what Proposition 8 and same-sex marriage really mean. From now on, it will be harder for opponents of same-sex unions to continue mouthing canards. The public as well as the courts have had an opportunity to hear the facts. The debate over same-sex marriage will never be quite the same again.