LawTalkers - Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Not sure whether you really think this, but my gay relatives don't. Any presidential leadership isn't about being the first to take a position. You can disagree on policy, but George W. Bush showed leadership on education with NCLB. He took existing ideas that other people had been pushing, but that doesn't take away from what he did.

Supporting "states rights" on the issue? A leader like Strom Thurmond and George Wallace.

What is the success rate for voter approved same-sex marriage? 0, zip, nada. I bet my gay friends top yours in that they were glad he finally supported the correct policy-ethical position, but disgusted that he wouldn´t say that there is a federal Constitutional right to same-sex marriage (assuming that there is any such right at all).

To follow his logic, he owes Rand Paul an apology, and direct the DOJ to not defend ongoing lawsuits against portions of the Civil Rights Act and Voting Acts.

LessinDresden

Adder

06-11-2012 05:18 PM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by LessinSF (Post 469467)

What is the success rate for voter approved same-sex marriage? 0, zip, nada.

I'm optimistic about Maryland in November. And I'm even more optimistic about Minnesota rejecting a state constitutional amendment that would ban it.

The president can help on both those fronts, in states that he's highly likely to win in November.

Sidd Finch

06-11-2012 05:21 PM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by LessinSF (Post 469467)

I bet my gay friends top yours

First Ty says "skin in the game," and now this. Y'all need to try a little harder.

Adder

06-11-2012 05:22 PM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sidd Finch (Post 469470)

First Ty says "skin in the game," and now this. Y'all need to try a little harder.

Sound to me like they Less's friends, at least, are hard enough.

Tyrone Slothrop

06-11-2012 05:25 PM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by LessinSF (Post 469467)

I'm not talking to lawyers, so I didn't hear any pushback about legal positions and constitutional rights. YMMV.

Sidd Finch

06-11-2012 05:29 PM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by LessinSF (Post 469467)

Obama expressed support for gay marriage. This is a tide-turner, especially from the first African-American president.

Could he have done it sooner? Sure. And LBJ could have supported civil rights sooner. C'est la vie.

Could have have been more forceful? Yes -- but that (unlike "sooner") would have been a mistake and counter-productive. He would have made the election a national referendum on gay marriage and little more.

You can compare this to Strom Thurmond et al, but that is either lazy or myopic (myopic in that you are only seeing the Constitutional question and not the political ones). In the Civil Rights arena, the federal government led. Saying "states rights" was a way to delay or prevent integration and equality, and the people who said that would, almost uniformly, have been perfectly happy to see segregation and inequality made part of federal law.

Now, the opposite is true. The federal government lags, and has for many years. (How far behind police departments was the military in allowing the openly gay to serve?) Saying "states rights.... but I support it" is a way to promote change and improvement.

And you can bet that Strom and the other states-righters would have taken the opposite view if the federal government had passed a law analogous to DOMA, and if the US Army had maintained segregation into the 1960s.

Setting a national battle-line over this would have been more dramatic, but would also have been disastrous.

Hank Chinaski

06-11-2012 07:48 PM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sidd Finch (Post 469474)

And LBJ could have supported civil rights sooner.

didn't he start almost immediately? I mean, once he was able to turn the admin's prime directive from finding chicks for the President to civil rights.

Hank Chinaski

06-11-2012 07:52 PM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sidd Finch (Post 469474)

I don't usually respond to the same post twice, but Obama was on record as being AGAINST gay marriage, wasn't he? LBJ was never for segregated lunch counters. And we all knew Obama was not really against gay marriage, he just said so because he felt he had to. We all might smile that he finally dropped being on board the neanderthal ship, but that is not leadership, and to compare him to LBJ on this issue is silly.

If LBJ "led" on civil rights the way Obama has on gay marriage I don't think Obama could be president today. I mean "politics?" Do you think LBJ didn't make blood enemies in the Dem party with those civil rights bills?

sebastian_dangerfield

06-11-2012 11:14 PM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Adder (Post 469387)

No, that's a terrible idea that's woefully regressive.

As I said, SS oesnt really need anything done. I'll go for means testing and/or taxing more of the benefit progressively, as I think that's actually a fair thing to do.

It needs to entirely jettison its disability benefits program. That has become unemployment by another name. It's outrageous. Between the rational opportunists trying to survive and the private benefits providers requiring prospective benefit recipients make SS claims, its creating a shadow entitlement society of staggering proportions.

But then... Fuck it. In the endgame, the currency of last resort is weaponry. Why not keep buying our bonds?

sebastian_dangerfield

06-11-2012 11:23 PM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop (Post 469306)

The only way to fix rising costs from car accidents is:

1. Pare down third-party payer involvement (insurance companies). Make it more a real market, where people buy a thing and see and feel how much it costs. This will immediately, radically, bring down unit prices and overconsumption. [Trust me on this. People will drive much more carefully when they're paying to repair their own cars and have to cover their passengers' medical bills.]

2. Do not allow anyone to make the argument, "But Americans do not want to bear the risks of catastrophic car accidents directly. They want insurance and have been trained to expect that." Tough shit. Welcome to life. Be responsible for yourself or else.

1-2. Fewer insurers acting as TPAs, more insurers acting as actual insurers, is an economic win/win. Your auto insurance analogy is shit. Give me an apt analogy and I'll take the bait.

Adder

06-12-2012 11:12 AM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield (Post 469487)

I don't know enough about disability benefits to have a view about whether or what should be done. Is it a large amount of money?

Sidd Finch

06-12-2012 11:12 AM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski (Post 469481)

Quote:

Johnson however, due to political expediency, was forced to vote with his fellow Southern Democrats in Congress, against civil rights measures such as banning lynching, eliminating poll taxes and denying federal funding to segregated schools, measures which later would make up ground breaking legislation. As a senator, Johnson’s opposition to Truman’s civil rights programme disgusted Texas blacks. His explanations were clearly within the contemporary Southern political context; he claimed the bills would never have passed anyway. Johnson also claimed he would be more helpful in another place and position, showing his political ambition and recognising he could only go so far in Texas. He also trotted out the standard Southern excuse for not helping African Americans, that he was "not against blacks rights but for states rights".

Johnson, like Eisenhower, thought civil rights legislation would try to force people to change and lead to violence. Despite this politically correct (in Southern eyes) action, Johnson was behind the scenes working to get black farmers and schoolchildren equal treatment in his congressional district, believing small, but real developments would be better than ground- breaking legislation. In 1938 Johnson secured federal funding for housing in Austin, Texas to benefit Mexican, African American and White slum dwellers. Johnson softened this for racist southerners by stating "This country won’t have to worry about isms [communism and fascism] when it gives its people a decent, clean place to live and a job. They’ll believe in the government." This behaviour may make Lyndon Johnson seem a Jekyll and Hyde character on race relations, his African American servants were treated well by Johnson in private until other racists visited Johnson and he put on a show for them to gain their support for his political ambitions.

By the mid-1950’s, Senator Johnson was clearly altering his stance on civil rights issues, being one of few Southern politicians who supported the 1954 BROWN decision by the Supreme Court.

So, let's see -- LBJ voted AGAINST banning lynching, and AGAINST denying federal funding to segregated schools. I didn't see anything about lunch counters, but the first two are a lot worse and I suspect he would have voted similarly if a lunch counter bill had come up.

In the mid-1950s, after the Brown decision, he changed his tune. Using this as a frame of reference, Obama is several years ahead, at least -- unless I missed the news that the USSC has ruled that gay marriage is a Constitutional right.

Sidd Finch

06-12-2012 11:21 AM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sidd Finch (Post 469494)

I did a little Googling to see if my recollection of this stuff, from history classes and watching Eyes on the Prize and whatnot over the years, was accurate. It was and is, and yours is wrong. This quote, I think, says it all (and took 2 minutes to find):

So, let's see -- LBJ voted AGAINST banning lynching, and AGAINST denying federal funding to segregated schools. I didn't see anything about lunch counters, but the first two are a lot worse and I suspect he would have voted similarly if a lunch counter bill had come up.

In the mid-1950s, after the Brown decision, he changed his tune. Using this as a frame of reference, Obama is several years ahead, at least -- unless I missed the news that the USSC has ruled that gay marriage is a Constitutional right.

Reading further:

Quote:

Johnson continued to remain careful and appeased the Southern racists, such as in 1956 when he killed a civil rights bill in Congress. Again, in keeping with his Jekyll and Hyde stance he changed his opinion in 1957. Whilst assuring Texans that there was "no foundation" to rumours he was promoting a civil rights bill, and stating he was "strongly and irrevocably opposed to forced integration of the races" he orchestrated, though diluted parts which would be offensive to southerners, the 1957 Civil Rights Act.

This dilution made fellow Southerner President Eisenhower’s bill into a largely unenforceable voting rights law. The part of the bill, which allowed federal government to promote integration in schools, was lost, due to the hostility BROWN and BROWN II had received in the South. Despite Johnson’s dilution of the act to make it merely a token gesture, the bill symbolised greater federal interest in civil rights and their enforcing; it also paved the way for more civil rights legislation. Johnson was also important in the passage of Eisenhower’s second Civil Rights Act in 1960.

And yet, you remember LBJ as a leader in civil rights, even though he frustrated black leaders and proponents of civil rights, and he lagged behind Eisenhower. 50 or 60 years from now, if gay marriage (and gay civil rights generally) is a normal part of our society, how do you think Obama, the first President to express support for gay marriage, will be remembered?

Hank Chinaski

06-12-2012 11:39 AM

Re: Pepper sprayed for public safety.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sidd Finch (Post 469495)

Reading further:

And yet, you remember LBJ as a leader in civil rights, even though he frustrated black leaders and proponents of civil rights, and he lagged behind Eisenhower. 50 or 60 years from now, if gay marriage (and gay civil rights generally) is a normal part of our society, how do you think Obama, the first President to express support for gay marriage, will be remembered?

You meant as a senator? I meant as President.

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