Jon Stewart interviewed Mike Huckabee recently, asked questions about gay marriage, and actually followed up with more questions designed to pin Huckabee's opinion down.
Is it just me or is Jon Stewart really transcending the boundaries of comedy to be on his way to becoming an actual, serious commentator? People have been speculating about this for some time, but it's been getting much more visible lately.
I wanted to post that last night, but couldn't find a good clip yet. Jon totally wrecked Huckabee, and made it very clear that homophobia is at the root of the problem. It was interesting to watch Lisa during the interview, because she supports gay rights but not gay marriage for the same basic reason Huckabee stated; I'm pretty sure Stewart's line of questioning changed her mind about the issue.
The interview was impressive. It was the closest thing to a true discourse with a politician than I have seen in quite some time, too bad it was so short.
I notice that Huckabee didn't mention anything about single-parent households. If all children should supposedly be supported by a male-female relationship, then according to his logic, single parents shouldn't be allowed to raise kids either.
Anyway, I did see the interview when it was on TV, and I was definitely glad to see that Jon's fighting journalistic spirit hasn't waned yet.
As does Washington D.C. Edit: Okay, sort of. The article says that they will recognize marriages performed in other states as legal, but it says nothing about whether they will perform marriages themselves.
I don't get it. Let's start from the top here: (be warned rage follows)
We can abridge rights if a majority opinion says its okay? How does that work? I can only imagine that next the California right will try to outlaw Hispanic voting. Maybe Hispanics in general!
EDIT: whoops, wrong on this one.
How do you justify keeping the already-existing marriage licenses in place? Talk about an insult. "The rest of you aren't good enough, but I guess you got lucky this time."
We can abridge rights if a majority opinion says its okay? How does that work? I can only imagine that next the California right will try to outlaw Hispanic voting. Maybe Hispanics in general!
This is the one that bothers me the most. When the court ordered us to desegregate schools, many southern states had a majority opinion against it. If we had taken a vote to see if it would stand, it would have been overwhelmingly in favor of returning to segregation. Things like which groups can have what rights shouldn't be left up to a populace vote. That's for things like what projects should get funding. The reason we have all the civil rights laws is because people, in general, are assholes.
The very reason the Supreme Court exists in the first place is to make unpopular decisions. It's why they have life terms that are irrevocable until the justice decides of his or her own free will to step down. Popular is not always best. In fact, we have a logical fallacy called ad populum.
The very reason the Supreme Court exists in the first place is to make unpopular decisions. It's why they have life terms that are irrevocable until the justice decides of his or her own free will to step down.
Actually, the justices on the California Supreme Court do not have life terms. They must be periodically reconfirmed by the electorate. Chief Justice Rose Bird was removed by the electorate after she got ahead of the curve in her opposition to the death penalty. Because her decisions made the electorate angry, they threw her off the bench. Many people think that the fear of being thrown off the bench had something to do with today's "split-the-baby" decision.
Many people think that the fear of being thrown off the bench had something to do with today's "split-the-baby" decision.
It might have more to do with the decision than the "split-the-baby" component (though I love that phrasing). How advantageous is it to your career to disagree with over half the electorate? I fear this is entering into conspiracy-theory territory though.
Yeah. Well, maybe someone will get the balls to take it to the ACTUAL Supreme Court. No worries about being voted off the bench there. Of course, no guarantee they will vote in favor of gay marriage.
Everyone knows separate-but-equal totally works, after all. Gay people and straight people can have two different things (civil unions and marriage), but they'll both be equal. Will definitely work. Just like segregated schools!
Here's a question. If this gets taken to the United States Supreme Court, which it will, should they even hear it? Is right to marriage under state jurisdiction, as based on the 10th Amendment? Or is marriage an enumerated right, as based on the 9th Amendment?
Here's a question. If this gets taken to the United States Supreme Court, which it will, should they even hear it? Is right to marriage under state jurisdiction, as based on the 10th Amendment? Or is marriage an enumerated right, as based on the 9th Amendment?
That's actually part of the debate. Is marriage to a partner you love a constitutional right or not?
From one perspective, they do have equal protection. Gay people are still allowed to marry people of the opposite sex. They are not denied this right. Technically, gay people have the same legal right as straight people in that they are allowed to marry a person of the opposite gender. Likewise, straight people of the same gender are not allowed to get married. Sexual orientation is insignificant. The real factor is the pairing of genders within the marriage.
The REAL question is are we allowed to discriminate between marriages based on gender match-up. They are not saying homosexuals can't marry...they just can't marry each other. To be honest, from everything I have seen and read, I do not think that marriage to someone you love is a constitutional right. It's just not covered. I'm plenty open to new evidence that I had not considered, but it's difficult to find. However, that doesn't stop me from thinking it should be legal everywhere, for everyone, because I have a liberal bias.
To play devil's advocate, the spirit and original intent of of the 14th Amendment was to stop racial discrimination. Also, do we really want our courts to be making the law when there is no explicit language in the Constitution discussing the issue of marriage? In Roth, for example, the court chose to interpret a law loosely that is written absolutely. In Roe, they fashioned a right that they acknowledged wasn't in the spirit or intent of the Fourteenth Amendment, but claimed it was in the periphery. Do we really want to go through the courts and encourage judicial activism when there are legislative mechanisms in place to change the Constitution? Is it a good thing to leave a decision like this in the hands of a few people rather than to leave it to popular vote and officials who were elected by popular vote?
Why is "marriage" a legal contract? Shouldn't everything be civil unions and only religious institutions can recognize or sanctify a marriage? This is a genuine question. I do not know the legal history and reasoning for the law upholding what has so long been considered a religious concern.
Why is "marriage" a legal contract? Shouldn't everything be civil unions and only religious institutions can recognize or sanctify a marriage? This is a genuine question. I do not know the legal history and reasoning for the law upholding what has so long been considered a religious concern.
Marriage is a wicked ancient religious convention. It existed long before our government did, so our government chose to address it. It's only recently that we've begun to question the appropriateness of denying benefits to a certain subset. I mean, it wasn't all that long ago that black people and women were property. Think about that. The fact that we still have an ancient religious convention in our law books shouldn't be too surprising.
That's the "why." It's a shitty reason, but there it is. Now, what ought to be is a different matter.
Why is "marriage" a legal contract? Shouldn't everything be civil unions and only religious institutions can recognize or sanctify a marriage? This is a genuine question. I do not know the legal history and reasoning for the law upholding what has so long been considered a religious concern.
Marriage is a wicked ancient religious convention. It existed long before our government did, so our government chose to address it. It's only recently that we've begun to question the appropriateness of denying benefits to a certain subset. I mean, it wasn't all that long ago that black people and women wereproperty. Think about that. The fact that we still have an ancient religious convention in our law books shouldn't be too surprising.
That's the "why." It's a shitty reason, but there it is. Now, whatoughtto be is a different matter.
All of this I know. I am asking the lawyers/law-nuts in the forum to address how marriage functions legally and why the law is still able to validate a religious ritual.
All of this I know. I am asking the lawyers/law-nuts in the forum to address how marriage functions legally and why the law is still able to validate a religious ritual.
If you think about it, legal marriage is really sort of about bureaucracy. When you are born, you get a birth certificate, so the government knows you legally exist. When you die, you get a death certificate, so you are legally dead. When you're 18, you sign up for the draft, so they know you are on your own now. Even if you don't sign up, you're probably going to file taxes soonish, and they know you are 18 from your birth certificate. When you marry, the government knows to subtract two individuals and add one family.
If you think in a 1700s way, you can think of a marriage license as legal transfer of dependence (more like ownership in those days) of a woman from her father to her husband. Nowadays it's an incentivized contract, implying that our society does, or did, want to encourage people to marry, and create families. Many of those incentives are holdovers from the days when it was assumed that the man would work, and the woman would stay home. You got legally married so you could mark your wife and kids as a dependent on the tax return.
Also, it is so that you can legally be considered next of kin, which matters in many legal situations, such as inheritance. If you didn't marry, you weren't legally kin. You were effectively stranger as far as the government is concerned. That's a problem in a society where much of the law is structured upon the assumption of families.
We have plenty of problems now because of laws that assume you can't make infinite perfect digital copies of things for effectively zero cost. We also have plenty of problems because of how many laws assume that the nuclear family is the default and expected social structure. Our society is changing about a million miles an hour faster than our laws. That is why more and more laws are starting to appear antiquated and unjust.
Regardless of your views on the religiosity of marriage, legal unions and nuclear families are not bound to disappear soon, if for no other reason than convenience. Let's face it -- we're all driven by the biological imperative. It's not like society is advancing to the point where we're going to stop reproducing. And women with children will always form the nucleus of our social groupings. Whether those groupings are hetero or homosexual is not really important.
What is important is that when mothers and partners share responsibility for raising young, there are certain legal concepts that need to be protected.
There is the right of the partner to see/care for/be responsible for the children, to have access to their medical and government files, to be legal guardians and stewards of the children's possessions and estates, to be liable for legal damages caused by the children, to be held culpable for providing necessities to the children, to be proponents of the child's legal rights, to have the right to discipline a child....
In short, kids will still need guardians, and that's what families are for. That's why marriage is still practical. They're more agreements to share responsibility and to be respectfully faithful to a mate than they are a contract with some mythical space-beard-and-toga-zombie-master.
Comments
With Jack Black as Jesus... Pretty funny.
Is it just me or is Jon Stewart really transcending the boundaries of comedy to be on his way to becoming an actual, serious commentator? People have been speculating about this for some time, but it's been getting much more visible lately.
Something that also struck me in that segment was Huckabee starting to talk about chromosomes. I thought he didn't believe in that.
Anyway, I did see the interview when it was on TV, and I was definitely glad to see that Jon's fighting journalistic spirit hasn't waned yet.
Edit: On further inspection, I am becoming more and more proud of Iowa. State motto: Our Liberties We Prize and Our Rights We Will Maintain.
Edit: Okay, sort of. The article says that they will recognize marriages performed in other states as legal, but it says nothing about whether they will perform marriages themselves.
I don't get it. Let's start from the top here: (be warned rage follows)
Everyone knows separate-but-equal totally works, after all. Gay people and straight people can have two different things (civil unions and marriage), but they'll both be equal. Will definitely work. Just like segregated schools!
From one perspective, they do have equal protection. Gay people are still allowed to marry people of the opposite sex. They are not denied this right. Technically, gay people have the same legal right as straight people in that they are allowed to marry a person of the opposite gender. Likewise, straight people of the same gender are not allowed to get married. Sexual orientation is insignificant. The real factor is the pairing of genders within the marriage.
The REAL question is are we allowed to discriminate between marriages based on gender match-up. They are not saying homosexuals can't marry...they just can't marry each other. To be honest, from everything I have seen and read, I do not think that marriage to someone you love is a constitutional right. It's just not covered. I'm plenty open to new evidence that I had not considered, but it's difficult to find. However, that doesn't stop me from thinking it should be legal everywhere, for everyone, because I have a liberal bias.
That's the "why." It's a shitty reason, but there it is. Now, what ought to be is a different matter.
If you think in a 1700s way, you can think of a marriage license as legal transfer of dependence (more like ownership in those days) of a woman from her father to her husband. Nowadays it's an incentivized contract, implying that our society does, or did, want to encourage people to marry, and create families. Many of those incentives are holdovers from the days when it was assumed that the man would work, and the woman would stay home. You got legally married so you could mark your wife and kids as a dependent on the tax return.
Also, it is so that you can legally be considered next of kin, which matters in many legal situations, such as inheritance. If you didn't marry, you weren't legally kin. You were effectively stranger as far as the government is concerned. That's a problem in a society where much of the law is structured upon the assumption of families.
We have plenty of problems now because of laws that assume you can't make infinite perfect digital copies of things for effectively zero cost. We also have plenty of problems because of how many laws assume that the nuclear family is the default and expected social structure. Our society is changing about a million miles an hour faster than our laws. That is why more and more laws are starting to appear antiquated and unjust.
What is important is that when mothers and partners share responsibility for raising young, there are certain legal concepts that need to be protected.
There is the right of the partner to see/care for/be responsible for the children, to have access to their medical and government files, to be legal guardians and stewards of the children's possessions and estates, to be liable for legal damages caused by the children, to be held culpable for providing necessities to the children, to be proponents of the child's legal rights, to have the right to discipline a child....
In short, kids will still need guardians, and that's what families are for. That's why marriage is still practical. They're more agreements to share responsibility and to be respectfully faithful to a mate than they are a contract with some mythical space-beard-and-toga-zombie-master.