JABbering Stooge

Since I just about had my Thanksgiving ruined by seeing this Maggie Gallagher column in the Roswell Daily Record on Thursday, I thought it’d be a good idea to run it through the ol’ Fisk-o-matic 2000™.

Above the Hate

Wow. Just the title alone reminds me of something JJ said:

How many times can irony be killed before it stays dead?

I don’t know, but it sure seems like Maggie Gallagher and the hate-filled Religious Right sure seem intent on finding out. Anyway, back to Gallagher:

(NOTE: Maggie Gallagher is the president of the National Organization for Marriage Gay-Bashing, which is sponsoring an AboveCausingtheHate.com campaign.)

There. I fixed your typo, Maggie.

Take this column with a grain of salt.

Oh, don’t you worry, Maggie. I always take your columns with a grain of salt. An Alaska-sized grain of salt!

I’ve been an opinion journalist columnist for 20 years, but when it comes to marriage I’m an activist for a cause I passionately believe in.

And another typo fixed. Sorry, Maggie, but considering that your columns have absolutely no relationship to the truth, “journalist” is not a position you should be listing on your CV.

This November, in the middle of a great blue Obama tide, Americans in three states spoke up clearly to agree: Marriage is the union of husband and wife.

See, here’s why Maggie shouldn’t pollute the profession of journalism by counting herself among them. Only one state, Florida, passed a gay-bashing amendment by the 3:2 ratio most people would consider a significant majority. Hardly a “clear” mandate for denying the humanity of homosexuals by relegating them to ninth-class citizenship.

That’s an ideal which most Americans, whether they are black or white, Democrat or Republican, evangelical or Mormon, cherish. The majority of people, and the majority of courts, recognize that same-sex marriage is not a civil right. Unions of husband and wife really are unique and deserve their unique status in law, culture and society.

Actually, according to this report by Media Matters for America, that’s not true. Support for equal rights for gays and lesbians, even the right to marry, has increased by anywhere from 8% (military service and adoption rights) to 10% (marriage rights), while opposition to increased homosexual rights has declined by 9% for adoption rights, 10% for marriage rights and 13% for the right to defend a country that has displayed substantial hostility to them in the past.

Don’t believe me? Check this out: Proposition 22, the 2000 referendum that wrote anti-gay discrimination into the California Civil Code, passed by a far wider margin than Proposition H8. (61.4%-38% in 2000 vs. 52.2%-47.8% in 2008)

By a clear margin of 53 percent to 47 percent, California voters rejected same-sex marriage as a civil right. The results have been horrifying — and I don’t mean for California same-sex couples, who remain protected by domestic partnerships that provide exactly the same legal rights and benefits as marriage.

It’s no surprise that the same faction that was crowing “Mandate!” about Bush’s 51%-49% “victory” as if he’d won by unanimous acclaim would see the almost-as-narrow passage of Prop. H8 (again, by a narrower margin than a similar measure in 2000) as a landslide victory for gay-bashing.

And quite frankly, Gallagher is lying through her teeth about the legal rights provided by civil unions versus plain vanilla marriage. Among other things, here are just a few of the thousands of rights that heterosexual marriage confers that aren’t granted by the "separate but equal" civil unions:

• Legally valid beyond state lines; less red tape to dissolve/annul; can’t be revoked on a bigoted judge’s whim

• Rights to hospital visitation and medical decision making recognized in all 50 states

• Several tax benefits, including gift transfers and inheritance; joint tax filing — this effectively amounts to a tax on being gay

• Social Security and veterans’ benefits; pension plan survivor benefits; guaranteed family leave to care for ill spouse

• Financial protection from “deadbeat” spouses/criminal penalties for being a “deadbeat” spouse

• Immigration assistance for bi-national families who want the spouse to become a naturalized citizen

• No common residence requirement

• No red tape involved in taking the spouse’s name

• Harder to use marriage records for blackmail purposes than civil union records

I think you get the idea.

In the last few weeks, the same-sex marriage movement has visibly morphed from a movement advocating for tolerance into a political tsunami which will brook no dissent and openly seeks to punish Americans who disagree with its new dogmas.

As opposed to religious conservatives, who have always been “a political tsunami which will brook no dissent and openly seeks to punish Americans who disagree with its old dogmas.”

Since California passed Proposition 8, extraordinary attacks have been unleashed — livelihoods threatened, artists blacklisted, property defaced, worship services blocked, and even some physical attacks directed at ordinary people simply because they say marriage means a man and a woman.

Waaaaaaaah! Some religious conservative in Kalamazoo got his hair mussed! Waaaaaaah! Seriously. The next time you want to start thumping your oh-so-precious Bible, do me a favor and look up Matthew 7:5 first. Between the hateful bile being pumped out by the gallon by religious conservatives and the subsequent rivers of gay blood shed in the world’s streets, religious conservatives have a looooooooooooong way to go before their martyrdom complexes have any validity in the eyes of the sane.

Religious minorities (Mormons and members of black churches) are bearing the brunt and too few voices are being raised to say this is wrong. No Americans, especially no minorities, should be afraid because they peacefully exercised core civil rights to vote or donate in support of an idea such as "marriage means a husband and wife."

Umm, Maggie, where were you when the pro-Proposition H8 forces were making companies and individuals afraid to exercise their core civil rights to vote or donate in support of that quaint idea that “all men are created equal”?

On the last day of the election, anti-Prop 8 forces ran a "home invasion" ad depicting two young Mormon missionaries ransacking homes. The ad further accuses Mormons in California of trying to take over the government because, as citizens, they participated in the political process by voting and donating to a cause they believed in. A week after the election The Los Angeles Times editorial board opined that No on Prop 8 forces should run more "hard-hitting" ads like "home invasion," along with more "in-your-face radicalism."

Right. Only the anti-Proposition H8 forces ran over-the-top ads full of lies.

On the "Dr. Phil" show last week I sat next to a powerful politician — Mayor Gavin Newsom — who ritually rejected violence but refused to decry these extraordinary threats to ordinary voters’ livelihoods. I also sat next to Joe Solmonese, head of the Human Rights Campaign, when a young Mormon in the audience asked him, "Why are you singling out my faith when so many other people supported Prop 8?" Did Joe, an amiable guy, take a moment to call his troops to back off from religious bigotry, to refocus on the larger problem — 7 million Californians disagree with his organization’s gay marriage civil rights dogma?

This is rich. The same woman who once said that “[p]olygamy is not worse than gay marriage, it is better” is now demanding an end to bigotry! I don’t know whether to laugh or cry at the willful cognitive dissonance.

No. I sat silent, dumbfounded, next to Joe when he pointed at the young man and cried, "We are going to go after your church every day for the next two years unless and until Prop 8 is overturned."

Ah, I see. Tarring an entire group for the sins of a few extremists is okay for thee, but not for me. Way to be consistent there, Mags.

My mouth dropped. This was Joe’s response just a few days after white powder was sent to LDS temples in Utah and California.

But no one else seemed to notice.

Oh, yes. Religious conservatives are so put upon that in some parts of the country they are given free reign to make the lives of anyone opposed to their theocratic agenda a living hell. Oh, and let’s not forget the fact that until the backlash against Proposition H8 began, anthrax hoaxes were exclusively used by religious conservatives.

If any political movement had aired ads attacking Jews for taking over the government because Jewish citizens donated “too much” money to a cause they believed in —everyone right and left would recognize that something very wrong was happening.

However, if a political movement had aired ads attacking atheists for taking over the government because atheist citizens donated “too much” money to a cause they believed in, Maggie Gallagher would enthusiastically endorse it. Oh, wait…

But right now, judging from their unwillingless to speak out, leaders of the gay marriage movement (including powerful politicians like Mayor Newsom) apparently believe that the new politics of payback works for them.

For the side of the aisle that invented the politics of payback, it’s hypocritical in the extreme for the likes of Gallagher to complain about it when they’re on the receiving end.

Something new and very ugly has entered American politics.

It is ugly, but it’s hardly new. In fact, I’d say that it dates back to about 1980, maybe even earlier.

Right now, the politics of hate may be centered on marriage, but if these tactics are permitted to work uncriticized, I promise you one thing: They won’t end there.

Actually, this is the one sentence in the entire article I can agree with Gallagher about. Just not for the reasons she imagines.

Naturally, one of the first commenters to respond displayed the stunning lack of self-awareness that seems to be a defining feature of the right:

Great article and observations.

The only statement I disagree comes toward the end of your article, "Something new and very ugly has entered American politics."

There is nothing new, in my opinion, about what is happening relative to the attacks on the Mormons, etc. Anytime a small, morally bankrupt group does not get its way, they will resort to bullying. This same group will be the first to cry when they are challanged.

Thank you again for a thoughtful article and have a great Thanksgiving!

Let’s see: small, morally bankrupt group that resorts to bullying when they don’t get their way and are the first to cry when challenged. Yep. That sums up religious conservatives perfectly, alright.