Prop 8 And Post Obama Thinking

hit the nail on the head–No on 8 was trailing the whole time, and the backers of No on 8 just didn’t do a good enough job of messaging. They simply were not tactical about getting the job done. Change is a comin though–it just may take time. My 14 year old half-sister goes to school with a bunch of two mommy and two daddy families, and it is viewed as quite commonplace (in Los Angeles)–she gets to vote next time around…

>>”Our struggle against discrimination is your struggle, too.”Why do we keep having to learn this lesson one chapter at a time?Congrats, Mr. Stranahan. You are now up there with Elvis in being able to turn our words into gibberish when you so choose. I blame all my remarks on this edit feature, by the way. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. (Damn I wish someone hadn’t made a country song out of that line–it used to sound much better without a tune attached to it, especially the stigma of that style of tune).

Lee, I watched everyone of your 30 Reasons videos with joy in my heart. Expect the bank account reason. Are you OK? Moving on, John Stewart summed it up best last night on the Daily Show. The new N-word is now the gay and lesbian community. I am a soldier and I believe I don’t fight to keep America safe but to protect the rights of all Americans. How could we vote to take rights away from anyone in this country? Is it the 1850s? I hate this Prop 8 crap. However, it is political suicide for Pres. E. Obama to touch this issue anytime in his first term. But if W. is any measure of a second term Pres. Obama can make gay marriage, drugs, after birth abortion and ever issue that the Neocons hate legal. Tell the oppressed in CA. that their freedom is coming just be patient and don’t kill Pres. Obama’s reelection.

o/twow, that Mika B is a real right wing tool–never again will I watch her on 1600–She makes Stretch’s tooliness seem mild. MSNBC is so LIBERAL–LOL.

Mr. Stranahan:Thanks for your 30 Days-30 Reasons.Also thanks for blogging here.Your opinions are a welcome addition, and you are spot on about how to win.

w0000t! Stranny in the hizzy! Awesome. Moar please.

The Mormons dumped something like 40 million dollars into Prop 8. I may not have the exact number right but it was 20-40 million and much of that came from out of state. They are very organized. I was even reading on another forum that a Mormon mom that usually home schools her kids sent them to public school just so she could work to get Prop 8 passed.The thing is marriage is a RIGHT! It isn’t something that should be voted on. It should just exist because it is the right thing to do to give everyone equal rights. I predict 15 to 20 years from now it will be legal throughout the USA and people will think it was barbaric that is wasn’t legal before. I hope it is sooner. There was a time when interracial marriage was illegal and most people wouldn’t agree with that now.

I have never understood why politics has to get in the bedroom and the doctors office. I for one stand with my gay friends on their right to live in a legal marriage if they so desire. It seems crazy to me that such a progressive state has fallen on it’s face regarding this issue.Thanks for the 30 Reasons. I enjoyed them all and couldn’t wait to see what was coming next!

Awesome to have you as one of the bigwigs, Lee! I loved your 30 Reasons series and look forward to reading more of your posts.It is truly ironic that the electorate who struck down the right of two adults in love to marry are the same people who passed the Prevention of Farm Cruelty Act. I’m a veggie and totally glad they passed prop 2, but at the same time it doesn’t make any sense. The voters were more concerned about the welfare of animals rather than people? The obsession of the religious right with other people’s lives, whether it be marriage or abortion, is pathetic. They need to go back home and worry about their own children and their own marriages. I hope the voters in CA can come together in a positive way and strike down Prop 8.

I don’t live in CA, so I don’t have any idea how the Prop 8 campaign was waged, except from what I read here and in other sources.This morning I saw Norah O’Donnell interviewing Gavin Newsom about it. She showed some statistics, and if I remember them correctly, 70% of Black voters and over 50% of Latino voters voted for Prop 8. It is disturbing that the same people who voted for Obama would have been so strongly for Prop 8. However, one thing I don’t see discussed is that cultural realities play a part here. Within both the Black and Latino communities, there is a strong lack of acceptance of gays and lesbians. Some of this may come from religion, as religion plays a strong role culturally in both communities. Some of it is traditional, the role of “machismo” if you will. There needs to be more outreach to and education within these communities if the rights of gays and lesbians to marry are to be upheld legally.

However, it is political suicide for Pres. E. Obama to touch this issue anytime in his first term. But if W. is any measure of a second term Pres. Obama can make gay marriage, drugs, after birth abortion and ever issue that the Neocons hate legal.Actually, while he might be happy to take up the cause when it’s politically ok for him to do so, it would be politically not ok for Congress to tackle it. For Obama, it would be a safe bet, but Democrats in Congress would be scared shitless at the prospect of facing the Republican Rage Noise Machines in an election year. Dems Favoring Gay Marriage/Civil Unions/Whatever would be the foundation of every Republican campaign commercial. They simply don’t know how to fight that kind of discrimination. Hell, they can’t explain the fucking constitution well enough to make their constituents understand that the PATRIOT ACT is a bad idea.I have no doubt Obama will keep the party unified and moving forward over the next 12 years, but as soon as his term is over, the Democratic Party will return to their usual brand of spinelessness when facing down unpopular, lawbreaking, bigoted asshole Republicans.Nationally recognized gay marriage will not be a reality in my lifetime, because we have no voice, no advocate in Washington with balls big enough to make it happen.So you’ll all have to forgive us if the only thing we have left is to stop traffic and ask anybody who might listen “Just what the fuck is your problem?”You’ll have to understand that our utter helplessness in this matter drives us to decide maybe we should stop by the local Mormon house of worship and yell at it’s disgusting edifice “JUST WHAT THE FUCK IS YOUR PROBLEM?!?”I’m sure everyone will not be surprised when we ask our leaders in the Democratic Party, including our new President, who we have supported for years through thick and thin only to be told to just be patient, it will happen one day, “JUST WHAT THE FUCK IS YOUR PROBLEM?!?”I refuse to buy into the “oh if only you had done it this way”, or “reached out to this community”, or, shit, why didn’t we think of this one –”learn a thing or two about how to win.”This is not our fault for not emailing enough, not buying enough ad time, not reaching out to who the fuck ever. This is not new issue. It did not spring forth from a fucking unicorn-adorned rainbow just a month ago. What more is there to do? Convince people harder? Louder?Fine. We can’t get married in California.Fuck you, California.FUCK. YOU.

Nanotyrannus,I beg to differ. First off, I bet gay marriage will be legal in California within five years. And it COULD be legal within two pretty easily – unless the strategy is just yelling at churches and cars.If you want to listen to the other side, they will tell you what their problem is. And sorry – the No on 8 aren’t showing me that they really want to win.This has been a real problem for liberals, who are often more comfortable complaining and feeling that the world is against them then trying to understand how to win elections. Obama and Howard Dean have shown the Democratic party how to win elections while still maintaining a progressive agenda. The lessons are there – outreach, pick your battles, grow the base, be disciplined, don’t play just to the base, match hate and lies with steady calm. These tools are available, and so are the tools of playing the poor persecuted victims damning the system that won’t even let you win.I say this with love because I want you to win. Please consider it.

First: Lee, your 30-day countdown videos were the daily highlights of a very stressful month. You are brilliant. You nailed serious, funny and poignant – not to mention truthful.Second, it was Mormon money that carried Prop 8 – to the tune of 80% of the money spent on the “Yes on 8″ campaign. I’m a Californian, and before that first ad of Newsome gloating and the “Mommy, our teacher says I can grow up and marry a princess!” there was still a really good chance that Prop 8 would be defeated. It had been consistantly trailing by several points. Much too late, the “No on 8″ side came back with a great ad showing a nice, middle-aged couple talking about how they supported all their children equally and were just as happy at their gay child’s marriage to her long-term partner as their straight child’s marriage. It put a benign, human face on the issue and should have been effective. But… Mormon money kept blanketing the airwaves with the “King and King” and sorry, shocked parents worrying about the sullied minds of their little innocents.In my own family, my sister and I voted No on 8 – and my brother-in-law illogically fell back on “I just don’t like to change the DEFINITION of marriage” and stubbornly voted Yes. Even though this is the year he finally became a Democrat and voted for Obama. This was also the year he changed from fundamentalist to Catholic. On the very day he was baptized a Catholic, the priest chastized a Protestant friend who was attending the ceremony for wearing an Obama button. The priest hissed at the friend, and I quote, “Obama is a murderer!” We all had to puzzle this out until we realized the priest was talking about Obama’s pro-choice stance and not mixing him up with McCain, who actually did drop bombs on women and children. There is just no end to the hypocrisy.Which leads to my third point: There is a petition making the rounds to have the Mormon Church stripped of its tax exemption. Fight them where it hurts. For that matter, I wouldn’t mind stirring up a bit of trouble for priests that make political statements at the church door. (I was there, too, and if I’d heard that remark I wouldn’t have gone quietly.)In a generation this will all be moot, but let’s get with the “fierce urgency of now” and do what we can to support our fellow humans in every kind of equality. I’ve signed the petition.

Not being from CA and therefore not being exposed to media about Prop 8, I kept having to catch myself when I was thinking about the vote, as far as Yes for the Ban or No for the Ban.I kept thinking it would have been simpler to say Yes for gay marriage, or No for gay marriage, instead of adding “ban.”I might have been dumb enough to vote yes, thinking I was voting yes for gay marriage, instead of yes for the ban.If my ramblings can be understood … do you think anyone else may have been confused?Wierd logic, I know. But????

Mr. S — thank you, too for all your wonderful “Reason” videos. I looked forward to them each day. They brought many a tear to my eye, none more so than your Reason 1, your beautiful children.

I agree that there was something about “Yes on 8″ messing with your brain. Even when I write about it, I have to think twice. “No” sounds negative – as in, take something away from someone. I wouldn’t be at all surprised that enough people mixed this up to trip the balance.

I live in LA and was bombarded by 8 pro and con commercials for months. The reason 8 passed is because it’s backers used scare tactics to scare up the paranoid delusion that with gay marriage legal, the public schools would, in effect, begin to recruit children into a homosexual lifestyle. I know that sounds like an exaggeration but it really isn’t. You should’ve seen the commercials–they were so over-the-top absurd and yet…they worked.Oh and note to Gavin Newsom: you could learn a thing or two from Obama in that when you win a political victory, it’s best not to hold a news conference to gleefully gloat and mock the opposition. As you can see, it backfired and even I as a left-of-center voter would have serious reservations about taking you seriously for higher office.

I refuse to buy into the “oh if only you had done it this way”, or “reached out to this community”, or, shit, why didn’t we think of this one –”learn a thing or two about how to win.”

I live in Los Angeles and reaching out to the communities that voted against you would’ve helped enormously. Now they’re taunting you. The No on 8 campaign was horribly run and the protests after the election mean so little when there were no protests before the election. And yes, I voted no on this bigotry and am as offended by its passage as anyone here.

Just how much longer do we have to keep on proving to heterosexuals that we’re not a threat? My understanding is that their are a few states, and yes whole countries, that allow gay marriage and whaddya know, they still have thriving economies, no man-on-goat weddings and the firey pits of Hell have not opened up and swallowed them whole. So tell me, what else is required? Seems to me that not trying to marry goats, not being child molesters, not demanding that churches marry us, not busting up heterosexual marriages, and not trying to destroy civilization would be enough.I’ll concede, however, that perhaps you are right.So, please, tell me. When you say “outreach” to the communities that voted against us, what do you mean? We should stop by and say hello? Maybe bring a pie, or a bag of Hot Pockets and Pop Tarts? What exactly will ease their fears? How can we convince them? What words or actions or behaviors that we haven’t tried up until this point will work?

My sister and I were passing through Hillcrest, San Diego, today and there was an enormous and peaceful anti-Prop 8 march going on. Went on block after block, with great signs, Moms with strollers, people arm in arm…. I know there’s a big counter-demonstration out there somewhere, but it still raised our spirits. We told my young nephew that he was seeing history here, too, and that peaceful protest is one of our rights in America. And that they would prevail.