News Roundup Marriage in New Mexico, Voter ID Challenges in TX and NC, New welcomes to the Family

       In New Mexico there’s a flurry going on about marriage equality and whether or not the issuing of marriage licenses is legal or not. New Mexico has a gender neutral marriage law so it’s anyone’s guess. Prior to this, I did a video that talked about the NM Supreme Court being asked to intervene to interpret the law and grant marriage equality In that state. Meanwhile, a woman dying of a terminal illness wants to marry her partner. The Governor of that state has also called for a vote to send a ban on marriage equality to the people saying it is better decided by the people of the state…to me that sounds like the slavery dodge when voters said: we’ll be slave state or we’ll be free…if anyone doesn’t know what Bleeding Kansas is, it’s simply when Missouri said we’ll kill all the abolitionists and hopefully that’ll be a slave state too. It backfired as voters called it a free state and all those lives were lost. So, while it’s a different situation and a different time it’s also like the 1905 vote in NJ when men voted down a woman’s right to vote and if we still wanted to do that Gov. Martinez might not even have been able to run for Governor of that state. But back to the point, NM Supreme Court has decided it won’t rule on the legality of marriage equality ahead of lower courts so it has a few years to go before we hear the Highest Court in the state issues a ruling on it. Also, NM Sup Ct has ruled against a photographer that has cited religious beliefs in refusing photography services to a lesbian couple Elaine Huguenin, who owns Elane Photography with her husband and is the business’s principal photographer, refused to photograph the ceremony because it violated her religious beliefs. The court rejected arguments that the anti-discrimination law violated the photographer’s right to free speech and the free exercise of religious beliefs. It was also a unanimous ruling. Also some time ago the NM Sup Ct had upheld the parentage of a non-biological mother to her child. The Elaine Photography case has been cited by Tony Perkins and Brian Brown of NOM to say that religious freedom will suffer if gay and lesbian couples are seen as married in the eyes of the law, but like the Ocean Grove case, it has to do with a business open to the public and an antidiscrimination law, not a marriage law. None of the cases they’ve cited has ever been a clear cut case of discrimination of religious persons for conscience violations.

In North Carolina, State Republicans continue to flub all over each other in how they can outdo their stupidity. Remember the motorcycle safety bill that has a related uterus bill in it? Wait…that’s related? Then they passed a Texas style voter ID law, I mean I saw that coming as soon as McCrory was elected!  But the icing on the cake is that the Governor who reminds me of an even more evil and stupid Ronald Reagan (whether he has Alzheimer’s or Romnesia remains to be seen) had greeted women with cookies (I guess it was to show that he can take on wifely duties and still be manly) but they wanted their reproductive rights back, and I’m sure that the law will be in court for some time to come. North Carolina used to be a progressive state and I’m sure Wisconsin was progressive enough until we see Republicans turn it into an ALEC paradise. Some legislation of note was a House Bill that said that if environmentalists or concerned citizens try to document animal rights abuses that they could be tossed in jail (not sure if that’s the correct wording according to the bill) but the name of it is ominous enough: The Commercial Protection Act, I mean…who protects the customers? I remember reading that a Butterball turkey company was revealed to have some shady practices and I don’t know the result but I’m sure it wasn’t good. That smacks of ALEC to me…but also, corporate liability issues are also of interest to me in light of this bill. So, getting back to the NC Voter ID case, it has been challenged in court by NAACP and civic groups who depend on mass voter registration efforts ahead of elections. Many of their efforts would be hampered by the VIVA act. Also at hand are cuts to early voting, increases the amount of people who can challenge petitions and voters I believe, increasing money to campaigns, as well as ridding the NC Sup Ct of public funds thus opening them up to the highest bidder. Next, an extreme effort to limit the voting rights of college students by moving the polls OFF of campus is being spoken of in order to suppress the vote and of course, as is the aim with most of the voter ID laws, making it TEN TIMES HARDER to vote because we voted for the black guy in 2008 and once again in 2012. Let me also mention that Colin Powell spoke in NC and said to Pat McCrory who was in the audience "I want to see policies that encourage every American to vote, not make it more difficult to vote," Powell said, according to the Raleigh News and Observer.

"It immediately turns off a voting block the Republican Party needs," Powell continued, according to the paper. "These kinds of actions do not build on the base. It just turns people away." Regarding charges of in person voter fraud he said "How can it be widespread and undetected?" he wondered.

I also want to mention that the Governor of North Carolina thinks that an 11-year old girl that wants to talk to him about her future is a liberal prop. Personally, as a man who is sick of Republicans embarrassing the great states in our nation I would be concerned about the future of North Carolinians and their access to healthcare, education, the voting booths, contraception, a safe abortion, food stamps, unemployment (which McCrory cut and NC is no longer eligible for $700M for unemployed persons and he gave his staff an 8% raise or maybe a double digit raise). This man and Governor Scott of FL, Corbett of PA, Walker of WI, and so many Congress members on the right side of the aisle have been embarrassing their states, not to mention the turtle himself. Mitch McConnell…I hope to serve up some turtle soup in November of next year…come on Kentucky!!!

TX is handling charges of blatant racial discrimination in their gerrymandered maps. They are using a defense that is unlike any other defense I’ve heard: We don’t discriminate against blacks, just blacks who vote Democrat, and therefore the partisan advantage is what we’re going after. In 2008, The Marion County Case, the Supreme Court said that Partisan advantage is not a reason to toss out Indiana’s voter ID law. Their law is worlds away from the TX law, but Section 3 is being tossed up as a defense as well as speaking of opting in TX. They can be opted out if they’re good for ten years; however, TX could only be good for 2 hours I doubt they’d be good for 10 years. Further, two House Members Rep John Lewis D-GA and Rep. Sensenbrenner R-NH who were key to the reauthorization of the Voter Rights Act in 2006 are teaming up again to remake it in light of Shelby County ruling. I will be on the lookout for more news

While I’m speaking on voter ID, I had a lively debate about voter ID and no one could point out a case of IN PERSON voter “fraud”. The cases they did show me were highly circumstantial like more people registered than residing in a county (counties don’t have that much contact with vital statistics to purge dead voters or out of state voters I presume) as well as other so called irregularities in statistics, I said prior that many agencies don’t talk to one another so those will persist with or without ID. Only case I hear of is one in NV where a woman tried to vote twice and was arrested, any other cases I heard of were fake signatures in petition drives or poll workers voting for family members as in a Chicago case and one jimmying with the vote in OR, hardly the widespread and undetected kind of voter menace that necessitates the need for strict voter ID laws. IN fact, reading the B14 law opinion from the DC Circuit Court, I found that TX already had pretty good safeguards especially the unique number that they got on their voter card.

In more news on voting according to Washington Post a huge 50 state rollout to make voting easier has been unveiled Democrats will push legislation similar to a Colorado measure signed into law earlier this year that requires all elections to be conducted by mail. “What we’re promoting is ease of access,” Sargeant said. “People are getting mobilized now to push back against these far-right attempts to limit democracy. Some of these efforts [by Republicans] have been ignored for too long, and now people understand that this is not something you can sit back and watch. You have to get involved and stop it” Sargeant wouldn’t comment on the new group’s budget. American Values First launched last week in Atlanta, during a meeting of the National Conference on State Legislators. I’m sure that this will go a long way to ridding the whole “wrong precinct throwout” laws we’ve been seeing pass in many states, including you guessed it, NC as a part of their voter ID law.

Now moving on to Tennessee. A family is devastated after an intergenerational relationship with their church came to an end after a lesbian detective has fought for spousal benefits. Kat Cooper’s Mom, Linda who was there when the council voted to extend partnership benefits to unmarried couples was told that she could either repent (of supporting her daughter and her daughter’s partner in the quest for benefits?) by disowning their daughter or leave. Let me state that most of the repenting that needs to be done is on the part of Straight Christians. Knowing that they had nothing to “repent” about they chose to leave, but the decision was not without tears. Linda’s grandparents were founding members of the church and went there most of her life. This is a sad story of people using the church to abuse people who are only doing what they know how to do, support their family. This church has engaged in spiritual abuse and the Pastor should be ashamed of himself for issuing an ultimatum to this family who had looked to this body as a source of fellowship and strength in a time of need. Church is a place where one shouldn’t have to feel beat up because they are there supporting a family member who happens to be gay. I bet disowning her would be more of what Jesus would do.

Moving a spotlight back to TX, Governor Rick Perry has been caught with his hands in the Obamacare jar trying to get $100M in funds to care for individuals with special needs. I find that funny as he said he would have no part of the Medicaid Expansion because he didn’t want to be shackled to the federal government. This is along the vein of Bobby Jindal and Paul Ryan the anti-stimulus crusader himself, caught suckling stimulus teat.

In gaydom, we have one surprising add to the flageroonies. Wentworth Miller came out while declining to go to Russia for a film festival. All I remember of him was Prison Break, where he goes to jail to break his brother out and then go after a shadowy group that framed his brother. That’s all I know of the show. I could be wrong, Then I find out Lucas Cruikshank who portrays Fred Figglehorn….the guy with the voice that sounds like he sucked on a helium balloon before recording every scene of his show. Who my niece likes…yeah he’s gay…anyone surprised? That’s like when Shaun T or Leandro Carvahlo or Anderson Cooper came out, or even more surprising…Ricky Martin! Or Raven Simone! Or Queen Latifah! Let me just say I had my suspicions after Set It Off . Yeah, that was so surprising, I had to turn around and do this! (Hand $100 off to someone I made a bet with that he was gay) Meredith Baxter, I didn’t know had no idea, didn’t follow her, now if Magghie Seaver aka Joanne Kerns came out as lesbian then I’d be thrown for a loop. I still love her curly hair from the earlier seasons of Growing Pains. So, with that I wrap up this segment

But in looking up pictures of The Queen herself; Latifah that is, I found that she’s coming BACK to the TV on Sept 16^th, I gotta find out what channel she’s on because I want to see it! I loved her show back in the day and they hit on important topics, it was kind of like Ricky Lake before she had her baby. But I wish Ricki all the luck now with her new show as she’s older, wiser and still one of the staples of 90’s talk TV like The Queen

So with all this I bid you adieu!