Colin Powell Calls for Abolishing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” Policy

February 3, 2010 — Ron Chusid

Efforts to abolish “don’t ask, don’t tell” are strengthened by the new support of Colin Powell for abolishing the  policy:

Gen. Colin L. Powell, who as the nation’s top military officer in the 1990s opposed allowing gay men and lesbians to serve openly in the military, switched gears today and threw his support behind efforts to end the “don’t ask, don’t tell” law he helped shepherd in.

“In the almost 17 years since the ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ legislation was passed, attitudes and circumstances have changed,” General Powell said in a statement issued by his office. He added: “I fully support the new approach presented to the Senate Armed Services Committee this week by Secretary of Defense Gates and Admiral Mullen.”

Robert M. Gates, the defense secretary, and Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told lawmakers on Tuesday that they supported President Obama’s proposal to repeal the 1993 law forbidding gay men and lesbians to be open about their sexuality while serving in uniform.

Posted in National Security, Social Issues. 1 Comment »

Republicans Believe The Darndest Things

February 2, 2010 — Ron Chusid

The Daily Kos/Research 2000 poll of self-identified Republicans which I mentioned yesterday is now officially out. Among the low-lights, a plurality believe Obama should be impeached. A majority believe Obama is a socialist, gays should not be allowed to teach or receive government benefits, oppose teaching sex-education in the public schools, believe schools should teach “that the book of Genesis in the Bible explains how God created the world,” and that abortion is murder. There are also significant numbers who either believe or are unsure about a number of other absurdities.

Posted in Barack Obama, Education, Evolution, Polls, Republicans, Social Issues. 5 Comments »

Republicans Are the Stupidest People In The World

February 1, 2010 — Ron Chusid

TPM has reported on the results of a Daily Kos/Reseach 2000 Poll of self-described Republicans which is not yet officially released. If this is accurate, Republicans are the stupidest people in the world:

• 39% of Republicans want President Obama to be impeached.

• 63% think Obama is a socialist.

• Only 42% believe Obama was born in the United States.

• 21% think ACORN stole the 2008 election — that is, that Obama didn’t actually win it, and isn’t legitimately the president, with 55% saying they are “not sure.” This number is actually significantly lower than it was in a similar question from Public Policy Polling (D) back in November, which said that 52% of Republicans thought ACORN stole it. So does this mean Obama is gaining ground among Republicans? As it is, only just over 20% of Republicans will say that Obama actually won the election.

• 53% think Sarah Palin is more qualified than Obama to be president.

• 23% want to secede from the United States.

• 73% think gay people should not be allowed to teach in public schools. This position puts the GOP base well to the right of none other than Ronald Reagan, who helped defeat the Briggs Initiative, a 1978 referendum in California that would have forbidden gays or people who advocated gay rights from teaching in public schools.

• 31% want contraception to be outlawed.

Posted in Barack Obama, Polls, Republicans, Sarah Palin, Social Issues. 9 Comments »

Obama To Seek Repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”

January 27, 2010 — Ron Chusid

Obama to seek repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy in State of the Union speech tonight according to several news agencies.

Posted in Barack Obama, Breaking News, Social Issues. 1 Comment »

Ben Nelson Shows He Cannot Be Trusted

January 27, 2010 — Ron Chusid

Yesterday I noted that Ben Nelson, the most conservative Democrat in the Senate, had stated he would not support a reconciliation measure to get health care reform passed. Today he says he would support reconciliation as long as he supports the underlying bill.

Nelson apparently does not realize that using the internet we can find out what he is saying to others, such as when he said in an interview with a conservative site that he planned to filibuster the final conference report in an effort to insert stronger anti-abortion language.

It looks to me like he is trying to please both Democrats who support health care reform as well as conservatives who oppose it by saying different things to different audiences. In other words, neither side should trust him.

Posted in Congress, Health Care, Social Issues. 1 Comment »

Karl Rove Shows Support of Traditional Marriage By Freeing Himself To Do It Once Again

December 29, 2009 — Ron Chusid

In 2004 Karl Rove helped George Bush get reelected by using state amendments opposing gay marriage to get out the vote. The Republicans campaigned as defenders of traditional marriage. Now Karl Rove is doing even more to defend traditional marriage–divorcing his wife after twenty-four years of traditional marriage, freeing himself to enter himself into another traditional marriage.

There is no word as to whether his marriage was destroyed because of the existence of gay marriage.

Karl Rove’s dedication to traditional marriage is even stronger. He was divorced once before (again no word if this was caused by the existence of gay marriage). This means that Karl Rove can now demonstrate his support for traditional marriage by getting married for a third time.

Posted in George Bush, Social Issues. 1 Comment »

Gay Marriage Killed the Dinosaurs

December 27, 2009 — Ron Chusid

A Facebook group explains:

Top 17 Reasons Why Gay Marriage is Wrong

17. Gay marriage will change the foundation of society; we could never adapt to new social norms. Just like we haven’t adapted to cars, the service-sector economy, or longer life spans.

16. Gay culture is a new fad created by the liberal media to undermine long-standing traditions. We know this is true because gay sex did not exist in ancient Greece and Rome.

15. There are plenty of straight families looking to adopt, and every unwanted child already has a loving family. This is why foster care does not exist.

14. Conservatives know best how to create strong families. That is why it is not true that Texas and Mississippi have the highest teen birthrates, and Massachusetts, Vermont, and New Hampshire have the lowest. This is a myth spread by the liberal media.

13. Marriage is a religious institution, defined by churches. This is why atheists do not marry. Christians also never get a divorce.

12. Children can never succeed without a male and a female role model at home. That’s why our society has no single parents.

11. Gay marriage is not supported by religion. In a theocracy like ours, the values of one religion are imposed on the entire country. That’s why we have only one religion in America.

10. Obviously gay parents will raise gay children, since straight parents only raise straight children.

9. Straight marriages are valid because they produce children. Gay couples, infertile couples, and old people shouldn’t be allowed to marry because our orphanages aren’t full yet, and the world needs more children.

8. Gay marriage should be decided by the people and their elected representatives, not the courts. The framers checked the courts, which represent mainstream public opinion, with legislatures created to protect the rights of minorities from the tyranny of the majority. Interference by courts in this matter is inappropriate, just as it has been every time the courts have tried to hold back legislatures pushing for civil rights.

7. Straight marriage will be less meaningful if gay marriage were allowed; the sanctity of Britany Spears’ 55-hour just-for-fun marriage would be destroyed.

6. Civil unions, providing most of the same benefits as marriage with a different name are better, because “separate but equal” institutions are a good way to satisfy the demands of uppity minority groups.

5. Straight marriage has been around a long time and hasn’t changed at all; women are still property, blacks still can’t marry whites, and divorce is still illegal.

4. Legalizing gay marriage will open the door to all kinds of crazy behavior. People may even wish to marry their pets because a dog has legal standing and can sign a marriage contract.

3. Gay marriage will encourage people to be gay, in the same way that hanging around tall people will make you tall.

2. Being gay is not natural. Real Americans always reject unnatural things like eyeglasses, polyester, and air conditioning.

1. METEORS and VOLCANOES.

Posted in Humor and Satire, Social Issues. 17 Comments »

Tim Pawlenty Supports Teaching Intelligent Design, Opposes Gay Rights

December 22, 2009 — Ron Chusid

Newsweek interviewed Tim Pawlenty. Pawlenty believes that the war in Iraq was a good idea even if “did we start off with an incorrect premise.” He believes Sarah Palin is qualified to be president. His worst answers came on social issues, even believing it is acceptable for schools to teach intelligent design:

Let me ask you about social issues your party has been dealing with. In her book, Palin claims that McCain’s handlers wanted her to be silent about her belief in creationism. How would you describe your view?
I can tell you how we handle it in Minnesota. We leave it to the local school districts. We don’t mandate a curriculum or an approach. We allow for something called “intelligent design” to be discussed as a comparative theory. It doesn’t have to be in science class.

Where are you personally?
Well, you know I’m an evangelical Christian. I believe that God created everything and that he is who he says he was. The Bible says that he created man and woman; it doesn’t say that he created an amoeba and then they evolved into man and woman. But there are a lot of theologians who say that the ideas of evolution and creationism aren’t necessarily inconsistent; that he could have “created” human beings over time.

I know you are opposed to gay marriage, but what about medical benefits for same-sex couples?
I have not supported that.

Why not?
My general view on all of this is that marriage is to be defined as being a union of a man and a woman. Marriage should be elevated in our society at a special level. I don’t think all domestic relationships are the equivalent of traditional marriage. Early on we decided as a country and as a state that there was value in a man and a woman being married in terms of impact on children and the like, and we want to encourage that.

To borrow a phrase, have your views evolved over time?
In 1993 I voted for a bill prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation in public accommodation, housing, and employment. That was 16 years ago.

Yes, gay-rights activists regarded you as a pretty cool guy at the time.
We overbaked that statute, for a couple of reasons. If I had to do it over again I would have changed some things.

Overbaked?
That statute is not worded the way it should be. I said I regretted the vote later because it included things like cross-dressing, and a variety of other people involved in behaviors that weren’t based on sexual orientation, just a preference for the way they dressed and behaved. So it was overly broad. So if you are a third-grade teacher and you are a man and you show up on Monday as Mr. Johnson and you show up on Tuesday as Mrs. Johnson, that is a little confusing to the kids. So I don’t like that.

Has the law been changed?
No. It should be, though.

So you want to protect kids against cross-dressing elementary-school teachers. Do you have any in Minnesota?
Probably. We’ve had a few instances, not exactly like that, but similar.

Little Green Footballs asks:

So what happens if a cross-dressing elementary school teacher wants to teach “intelligent design” creationism? Imagine, if you will, the massive cognitive dissonance that would ensue.

Posted in Education, Evolution, Republicans, Social Issues. 3 Comments »

Cynthia Nixon Protesting Stupak Amendment

December 21, 2009 — Ron Chusid

While everyone has been concentrating on the positive and negative aspects of the Senate health care bill, the big problem with the House bill has almost been forgotten. Cynthia Nixon has been speaking out against the Stupak amendment:

It’s been a little more than a week since Cynthia Nixon flew back from filming “Sex and the City 2″ in Morocco, and she’s already diving headfirst into the debate surrounding abortion and health care reform.

Nixon, a longtime abortion rights activist, says she can’t keep quiet about the recent health care bill amendments that would limit insurance coverage for abortions.

“It’s a very basic female right that we need to protect,” Nixon said. “What’s so frightening about this Stupak ban is that he’s found a backdoor way to basically not cover abortion for the vast majority of American women.”

The Stupak-Pitts amendment, written by Democratic Rep. Bart Stupak of Michigan and Republican Rep. Joseph R. Pitts of Pennsylvania, is a point of contention in the House health care bill. The amendment would limit funds in the health care bill, preventing subsidies from directly paying for abortions and also from paying for any insurance plan that covers abortions.

The prohibition excludes cases of rape, incest or when the mother’s life is in danger.

CNN interviewed Nixon about her protests of the Stupak amendment:

CNN: You’ve been very outspoken in the past few years about LGBT issues and rights, but not as much about reproductive health. When did you start becoming vocal about being pro-choice?

Cynthia Nixon: I’ve been involved since I was 15, so we’re talking almost 30 years now.

My mother had an illegal abortion pre-1973, and it’s something that I would never want to face or want my daughter to be facing or any of her friends. Abortion is a right I feel must not go away, and I feel like people aren’t mobilizing so much because it’s so complicated and it’s difficult to understand.

CNN: But some say that all the Stupak-Pitt amendment does is essentially hold up the current law that restricts federal funding from providing abortions.

Nixon: That’s patently false. The new people coming in would be people making less than $88,000 a year in a family of four and would be getting their insurance in the form of tax credit. That credit is coming through the federal government.

[For] the majority of women who have health insurance now, abortion is covered as a complete given. Once these new people come in, we’re looking at adding 36 million people to these tax credits, and they will not have abortion offered as an option on their health insurance. That’s a really large chunk of people, but the thing is also how it will affect the marketplace. …

They’re saying you could buy [a rider] additionally, but for how much? It’s going to be exorbitantly expensive, and it’s not a thing people are going to do.

By the very nature of abortion, nobody intends to have one. Nobody intends to get pregnant by mistake, nobody intends to be raped, nobody intends to be [a victim of incest], and no one intends, in the course of a wanted pregnancy, to have a catastrophic event that requires an abortion.

Posted in Congress, Entertainment and Leisure, Health Care, Social Issues. 1 Comment »

The Inevitability Of Marriage Equality

December 9, 2009 — Ron Chusid

Ben Smith writes that the inevitability of gay marriage is in doubt:

After a year that saw laws allowing same-sex marriage expand from a lonely toehold in Massachusetts to five other states and, likely, the District of Columbia, the defeats have served at the least as a reality check to proponents of gay marriage.

A Maine referendum that was seen as the best chance for popular approval of same-sex marriage instead was soundly defeated. The state senate in liberal New York voted down a marriage bill by a margin – 38 to 24 – that stunned advocates and the state’s governor, who had predicted victory. And a same-sex marriage measure limped to the floor of the New Jersey state senate Thursday after squeaking out of committee over the opposition of prominent Democrats.

“The events of the last few months have put a serious dent in the idea that gay marriage is inevitable,” said Maggie Gallagher, the president of the National Organization for Marriage, which opposes same-sex marriage.

The movement to expand marriage to include gays and lesbians has gathered force from the perception that it’s a historic civil rights battle, and that its foes are – as advocates often say – on the “wrong side of history.” That’s a message that has animated supporters, silenced opposition – just one New York legislator, for instance, stood up to explain his “no” vote – and generated its own momentum. It has also penetrated broadly into the culture, said Democratic pollster Diane Feldman, whose surveys have found a solid majority of Americans view same-sex marriage as inevitable, “and are variously pleased or resigned to that.”

The events of this year are meaningless with regards to the belief that acceptance of same-sex marriage is inevitable. Republicans gained many votes in 2004 by using referendums on same sex marriage to get out the vote. Conditions have not changed that much since then. What is important is that tolerance is far greater among younger voters:

A Gallup poll from May, for instance, found that 18 to 29 year olds favor same-sex marriage by a margin of 59% to 37%, while people 65 and over oppose it by an even wider margin. And other studies have suggested the support among young voters is broad, and stretches across regions. One recent Columbia University study reported that more than 50% of 18-29 year olds in 38 states support same-sex marriage.

Acceptance of same-sex marriage is inevitable, but it is probably still several years away. I thought this was the case before the matters mentioned above were considered and the outcome this year does not change the long term trend towards greater tolerance.

Posted in Social Issues. No Comments »

Men and Porn

December 3, 2009 — Ron Chusid

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This story has a great headline which is being spread around but this conclusion is not really substantiated. The Telegraph reports: All men watch porn, scientists find:

Researchers were conducting a study comparing the views of men in their 20s who had never been exposed to pornography with regular users.

But their project stumbled at the first hurdle when they failed to find a single man who had not been seen it.

“We started our research seeking men in their 20s who had never consumed pornography,” said Professor Simon Louis Lajeunesse. “We couldn’t find any.”

Although hampered in its original aim, the study did examined the habits of those young men who used pornography – which would appear to be all of them.

Prof Lajeunesse interviewed 20 heterosexual male university students who consumed pornography, and found on average, they first watched pornography when they were 10 years old.

Around 90 per cent of consumption was on the internet, while 10 per cent of material came from video stores.

Single men watched pornography for an average of 40 minutes, three times a week, while those in relationships watched it 1.7 times a week for around 20 minutes.

Their findings would be more meaningful if they had interviewed more than twenty men in their 20’s. I don’t know if the title findings of  all men watching porn is valid with this sample size but any sample of twenty men in their 20’s would be expected to have a very high number who do view porn.

Update: James Joyner agrees with regards to the limitations in the sample studied but seems to think that the easy availability of porn on the internet is a bad thing.  (On further update, see his comment for clarification of his view as to whether this is good or bad.)

Posted in Science, Social Issues. 7 Comments »

Religion Continues To Influence Public Policy Even With GOP Out

December 1, 2009 — Ron Chusid

Sarah Posner argues in The Guardian that the influence of religion on government has continued despite the Democrats replacing the Republicans. The most obvious example was in the restrictions on the funding of abortion added to the House health care legislation.

Instead of questioning how religion – exclusively the conservative variety – became so intertwined with politics in a secular democracy, Democrats decided to embrace it themselves. Candidates now need the imprimatur of a Bible verse to have credibility with “religious” voters. Democrats must abandon their supposedly strident views on reproductive choice to satisfy pastors who essentially campaign from their pulpits. Candidates now feign embarrassment that they once spoke at a Planned Parenthood dinner. The party believes it must recruit candidates who are “pro-life,” even if they oppose providing basic health services for women, and participate in misinformation campaigns designed to portray coverage for abortion as complicity in genocide.

The “new” and avowedly more “centrist” evangelicals and Catholics sought by the Democrats claimed to care about global warming, poverty, and healthcare reform. Yet some of them have signed onto the Manhattan Declaration, which too compares abortion to genocide, and elevates gender and sexuality issues above all others. This constituency may indeed care about those other issues. But when it comes down to the wire, the abortion issue matters to them most.

Democrats need to decide what matters to them: winning elections by compromising the freedoms of American women, or standing up to church bullies.

Posted in Congress, Democrats, Separation of Church and State, Social Issues. 2 Comments »
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