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KIM JONG TRILL posted:Voting for a more liberal third party tells the Democratic Party that they need to shift left to get your vote. Voting for the Democratic Party unequivocally because they are better than the Republicans does nothing in the way of pushing them to champion an issue. Voting for a third party tells the Democrats nothing. They aren't going to court the votes of socialists because they're a center-right business party that has to check a poll before they know how liberal they stand on social issues.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 21:48 |
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# ? Apr 25, 2024 23:27 |
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When the Democrats notice that they would have won with their numbers + the Greens or whatever, they'll rethink how they accomplish things. What's keeping California from simply having some kind of Prop 9 or whatever to repeal Prop 8? Their initiative system is so easily abused that it's the de-facto argument against direct democracy. You can basically change anything you like with an amendment proposition and companies can and do try and buy laws.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 22:13 |
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Craptacular! posted:What's keeping California from simply having some kind of Prop 9 or whatever to repeal Prop 8? Their initiative system is so easily abused that it's the de-facto argument against direct democracy. You can basically change anything you like with an amendment proposition and companies can and do try and buy laws.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 22:15 |
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Craptacular! posted:When the Democrats notice that they would have won with their numbers + the Greens or whatever, they'll rethink how they accomplish things. ...but in the meantime someone else has won, and in many places would be quite content to strip away any and all progress that's happened
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 22:15 |
KIM JONG TRILL posted:Voting for a more liberal third party tells the Democratic Party that they need to shift left to get your vote. No it doesn't and this has never been true.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 22:18 |
Craptacular! posted:What's keeping California from simply having some kind of Prop 9 or whatever to repeal Prop 8? Their initiative system is so easily abused that it's the de-facto argument against direct democracy. You can basically change anything you like with an amendment proposition and companies can and do try and buy laws. New PPP poll out of North Carolina is interesting. Amendment 1 is up 53-38. Full results in PDF. If you're optimistic, only 31% understand what the amendment does and we lead 42-41 when it's explained. If you're pessimistic, the crosstabs suck, even when it's explained, and we're not winning unless we run up the score among 18-29 year olds.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 22:23 |
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Riptor posted:...but in the meantime someone else has won, and in many places would be quite content to strip away any and all progress that's happened So what? If you feel both parties are bad, shut up and say it. The most that's lost is a Congressional seat here and there, you shouldn't do it with the Presidency because the amount of money required to run is so much that ideologues looking to make a point shouldn't even bother to run as they'll simply be ineffective (looking at you, Ron Paul.) It's even worse in countries where parliaments or what have you control over the military, we're somewhat fortunate in that we can protest for a more progressive legislature without handing the military to crazy people.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 22:23 |
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breaklaw posted:Anybody else think Obama might come out for marriage equality if he gets a second term? I think he might. Or at least something like not letting states ban civil unions. There's been rumors and hints and I think he'll do it.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 22:35 |
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UltimoDragonQuest posted:Basically everyone ran out of money and the AFER lawsuit is pretty much the only shot for the next 2-4 years. Prop 8 wiped everyone out and it would have taken years of work and money to win in 2012. There are a lot of people upset that nobody really tried. I did my absentee voting to oppose this (also to see how long we can keep Santorum in the race). My vote probably won't help though.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 22:39 |
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PPP re: NC Amendment posted:When voters are informed that the amendment bans both gay marriage and civil unions their tune changes quite a bit. Only 41% of voters say they'll support it knowing that, while 42% are opposed. I still don't understand why LGBT groups don't push for civil unions as a temporary milestone. I mean, of course I understand it - separate but equal isn't acceptable - but I can never be convinced that doing so wouldn't speed up the realization of full equality. I mean, it would be like "OK let's just let them have civil unions so they shut the hell up and we can still feel superior", and then five years later "Well, they already have civil unions, it's pretty much the same thing anyway, what the hell". Not being gay or a gay activist it really isn't my place to judge, but being goal-oriented, really trying to figure out the best way to achieve something - this has to be to considered as a strategy.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 22:44 |
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breaklaw posted:I still don't understand why LGBT groups don't push for civil unions as a temporary milestone. I mean, of course I understand it - separate but equal isn't acceptable - but I can never be convinced that doing so wouldn't speed up the realization of full equality. "It isn't my place to judge, but lemmie judge for a bit..." We don't accept CUs because it's separate but equal, and really in the year 2012 that should be enough of a reason. If I must go on, though, the major issue is if we do settle for CUs and wait the five years you suggest, then we give the right ammo to go 'well for five years it's worked just fine like this why would you want to change it?!' Every year that we 'hold the line' on CUs instead of marriage is one more year to go 'eeeeh, you're pretty much equal now and it's worked well for this long, let's not mess with success guys!' for apathetic voters. The only way to get marriage, like every wifebeater and vegas wedding already gets in this sacred union, is to never accept anything less, because as soon as we accept less it becomes 'why can't you leave well enough alone'.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 22:48 |
breaklaw posted:I still don't understand why LGBT groups don't push for civil unions as a temporary milestone. I mean, of course I understand it - separate but equal isn't acceptable - but I can never be convinced that doing so wouldn't speed up the realization of full equality. State-Civil Union Date-Marriage Date CA-2003- VT-2000-2009 CT-2005-2008 NJ-2006- NH-2008-2009 WA-2009-2012 IL-2011- HI-2011- DE-2011- RI-2011 That being said nobody should be happy with civil unions for more than a few years because they are legally inferior, personally insulting, and plainly unconstitutional. e: Civil unions are near dead at this point anyway. The only plausible states where they could pass in the near future are Colorado (where marriage is unconstitutional), Minnesota, New Mexico, and Maine (where they will never settle for less than marriage). UltimoDragonQuest fucked around with this message at 23:18 on Apr 1, 2012 |
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 23:15 |
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Glitterbomber posted:We don't accept CUs because it's separate but equal, and really in the year 2012 that should be enough of a reason. If I must go on, though, the major issue is if we do settle for CUs and wait the five years you suggest, then we give the right ammo to go 'well for five years it's worked just fine like this why would you want to change it?!' Thinking goes that a lot of people want the state to recognize their partnership for all sorts of reasons, but want a lighter alternative to marriage. The shift might have also resulted in the further decay of marriage as people stopped participating, while anti-gay conservatives can point to it and say: 'see this is exactly what happens when we don't defend the institution of marriage.' Expanding the institution of marriage to include gay people gets around this problem. And that's because supporting gay marriage, far from being a threat to marriage, is actually a socially conservative pro-marriage position. Gay marriage seeks to preserve the institution of marriage by reforming it with the times.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 23:23 |
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Marriage, as an institution, should die. I like the dependency idea posted earlier in this thread. And my wife agrees.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 23:55 |
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Mrit posted:Marriage, as an institution, should die. That's awesome but A) not the topic, and B) the work in deleting marriage as a concept is so, so, much bigger and wide affecting than just going 'ok, gonna change this from a man and woman to two adults'. edit: Also a wee bit insulting to be all 'well I'm straight and married and we'd be happy to get rid of it' in a topic about gays wanting to be married at all.
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# ? Apr 1, 2012 23:58 |
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I was going to defend myself but since I'm fully for marriage equality and all you seem to want to do is argue with everyone, why bother?
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# ? Apr 2, 2012 00:17 |
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Mrit posted:I was going to defend myself but since I'm fully for marriage equality and all you seem to want to do is argue with everyone, why bother? Because you're proposing a more complicated alternative to simply allowing gays to marry while passively giving out the fact you are married, the very thing that homosexuals are fighting the rights for. It's like a poor kid wanting a cookie and you throwing yours in the trash because you have so many you can do without this one.
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# ? Apr 2, 2012 00:23 |
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Oraculum Animi posted:Because you're proposing a more complicated alternative to simply allowing gays to marry while passively giving out the fact you are married, the very thing that homosexuals are fighting the rights for. In total fairness it's more along the lines of saying 'well I want you to have a cookie too, but let's just bake a whole fresh batch together sometime, look see it's no biggie' and then chucking it.
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# ? Apr 2, 2012 00:27 |
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Glitterbomber posted:In total fairness it's more along the lines of saying 'well I want you to have a cookie too, but let's just bake a whole fresh batch together sometime, look see it's no biggie' and then chucking it. Though not to belabor the point, gay marriage is often framed from an argument to equality: marriage denied to gay people turns gay people into second class citizens. This is true, but I've found that when arguing with conservatives it's not very convincing to them, because they don't think gay people are actually equal. But they do believe in traditional institutions. I like to say: well, I don't know if you thought about it this way, but gay people getting married is kind of a conservative thing to do, isn't it? Here's an entire class of people who have no incentive to adopt a conservative world-view, who are denied state incentive to settle down, etc. The gay rights movement used to say "We're here, we're queer, get used to it." Implicit was that gay people were radical, and not like straight people and you should learn to deal with that. But now the gay movement is saying it wants the government to allow gay people to behave, well, a lot like straight people. 'Gee, I guess you're right, I never thought about it that way.'
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# ? Apr 2, 2012 00:30 |
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Oraculum Animi posted:Because you're proposing a more complicated alternative to simply allowing gays to marry while passively giving out the fact you are married, the very thing that homosexuals are fighting the rights for. It probably would be good for people to vocally advocate for such a thing so as to make gay marriage a more appealing conservative alternative, though.
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# ? Apr 2, 2012 01:53 |
eSports Chaebol posted:It probably would be good for people to vocally advocate for such a thing so as to make gay marriage a more appealing conservative alternative, though. "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
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# ? Apr 2, 2012 02:43 |
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breaklaw posted:I still don't understand why LGBT groups don't push for civil unions as a temporary milestone. I mean, of course I understand it - separate but equal isn't acceptable - but I can never be convinced that doing so wouldn't speed up the realization of full equality. On top of the reasons already stated, many bigots are against civil unions as well as same-sex marriage. Look at Michigan, prop 02-2004 was sold as protecting the sanctity of marriage but all one had to do was look at the text of the proposition to see it would go farther than that. Those of us trying to defeat it brought this up and proponents said it was typical legal boilerplate and continued to advocate it on the platform of only protecting marriage. The proposition passed and is now enshrined in the Michigan constitution and in 2011 the state legislature passed a law making it illegal for universities or any other entity that receives funding from the state while offering any sort of benefit to same-sex partners. I'd "settle" for a domestic partnership as anything would be better than nothing in my eyes but the bigots aren't going to let that fly either so why no go for broke (marriage)?
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# ? Apr 2, 2012 15:36 |
Nostalgia4Infinity posted:On top of the reasons already stated, many bigots are against civil unions as well as same-sex marriage. Look at Michigan, prop 02-2004 was sold as protecting the sanctity of marriage but all one had to do was look at the text of the proposition to see it would go farther than that. Those of us trying to defeat it brought this up and proponents said it was typical legal boilerplate and continued to advocate it on the platform of only protecting marriage. The proposition passed and is now enshrined in the Michigan constitution and in 2011 the state legislature passed a law making it illegal for universities or any other entity that receives funding from the state while offering any sort of benefit to same-sex partners. Many are, but not all. As you see from the NC poll UltimoDragonQuest posted above people are significantly more likely to support civil union type legislation. There is even more support for things such as legislation allowing inheritance and hospital visitation. I mean, even in loving Texas that enjoys 88% approval. I've had the best luck convincing people from the religious angle actually. I point out that while many religious groups have issues with same sex marriage there are also churches which do support it and would like to perform such ceremonies. What gives the state the right to tell those churches that they may not practice their religion as they see fit? I also throw in that the laws being advocated for same sex marriage don't in any way require churches to perform them any more than current religious discrimination laws require a Catholic church to marry a Jewish couple, and I would fight fiercely against any law that would do so. That argument just seems to really reach a bunch more people because it gets across that this isn't about asking for extra rights (as the bigots like to claim) but instead is about not imposing one religion's beliefs on others. It doesn't work on many the hard core evangelical groups of course because they have no ideological problem with imposing their beliefs on others; there is no getting through to them anyway.
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# ? Apr 2, 2012 18:05 |
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I think this is the best place for this: Appeals Court Hears Arguments on Gay Marriage Law New York Times posted:April 4, 2012
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# ? Apr 5, 2012 19:29 |
"The sanctity of marriage" thing never fails to crack me the gently caress up. I'd like to see people rally behind anti-divorce legislation to protect the sanctity of marriage oh wait straight people need those.
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# ? Apr 5, 2012 20:06 |
SpiderHyphenMan posted:I think this is the best place for this: 44 states still won't recognize it unless SCOTUS is super nice and repeals all of DOMA.
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# ? Apr 5, 2012 20:49 |
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UltimoDragonQuest posted:Basically everyone ran out of money and the AFER lawsuit is pretty much the only shot for the next 2-4 years. Prop 8 wiped everyone out and it would have taken years of work and money to win in 2012. There are a lot of people upset that nobody really tried. Companies buy propositions for their own business interests and awareness all the time. If Morgan Spurlock can get companies to give him money for a film about how much money they're giving him, it seems like an easy sell to find some big, socially progressive company looking for awareness and put something with a name like "The No-Carb Whopper Initiative For Marriage Equality in California, Presented by Burger King." And if you think that's stupid, I agree; but California's political system allows it and that's ridiculous for a state that size.
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# ? Apr 6, 2012 02:05 |
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KIM JONG TRILL posted:Voting for a more liberal third party tells the Democratic Party that they need to shift left to get your vote. Voting for the Democratic Party unequivocally because they are better than the Republicans does nothing in the way of pushing them to champion an issue. I'm curious about something. If both of these things are true: 1: We have to vote for more liberal parties to send a message! 2: We have to vote for Democrats or else Republicans will win and take us backwards! What about the following strategy: If you're in a Solid Blue state, vote for a Pro-Marriage third party, but if you're in Wavering Purple, vote Democratic. This minimizes the chance of sending a Republican into an office, while still having large numbers of people being able to protest vote Democratic stupidity. It also makes sense on another level: If you're attempting to recruit Democratic voters for a third party campaign, you'll presumably have more luck in an area where there are are already lots of Democratic voters anyway. I can't think of any plausible sounding downsides, though, which makes me concerned I'm missing something. What are the flaws in this plan?
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# ? Apr 6, 2012 12:17 |
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Michaelos posted:I can't think of any plausible sounding downsides, though, which makes me concerned I'm missing something. What are the flaws in this plan? You're voting for a third party. Which -- unless you have a lot of other people doing it -- will amount to voting for nothing.
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# ? Apr 6, 2012 13:30 |
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Nostalgia4Infinity posted:You're voting for a third party. Which -- unless you have a lot of other people doing it -- will amount to voting for nothing. It's the exact opposite, actually; voting for a third party will in almost all cases amount to more than voting for the republicans or democrats.
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# ? Apr 6, 2012 17:55 |
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Valie posted:It's the exact opposite, actually; voting for a third party will in almost all cases amount to more than voting for the republicans or democrats. Can you point out precedence of this that's younger than a century or so?
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# ? Apr 6, 2012 19:03 |
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Nostalgia4Infinity posted:You're voting for a third party. Which -- unless you have a lot of other people doing it -- will amount to voting for nothing. Voting for the losing party also amounts to voting for nothing though, so you're really only giving up a 50-50 chance of influencing the election (unless it really is decided by one vote).
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# ? Apr 6, 2012 19:33 |
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Nostalgia4Infinity posted:You're voting for a third party. Which -- unless you have a lot of other people doing it -- will amount to voting for nothing. Isn't voting in a first past the post election system just wonderful.
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# ? Apr 6, 2012 20:11 |
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If it matches my concsience I don't mind 'throwing my vote away' on a third party candidate. I mean hell, I threw one away on Obama back in '08
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# ? Apr 6, 2012 23:29 |
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SpiderHyphenMan posted:I think this is the best place for this: So, wait, does Congress have legal standing to defend DOMA? I thought there was some dispute about whether they could even hire someone to defend it?
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# ? Apr 7, 2012 06:50 |
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Nostalgia4Infinity posted:You're voting for a third party. Which -- unless you have a lot of other people doing it -- will amount to voting for nothing. Voting for the Democrats even when you're unhappy with them simply because they are the least lovely of the two major parties, however, is not exactly a winner of a move either - because doing so removes any motivation for the Dems to stop being "the less lovely party" and actually start becoming, you know, not-lovely. The whole "wasted vote" mindset is common enough that it even has its own Wikipedia page, but even when a third party candidate doesn't win and even helps "the other party" get elected there's still some thought that says they have a broader influence on the political landscape by introducing issues and giving attention to causes that the Big Two might otherwise happily ignore. Hell, Perot's run for President in '92 was widely criticized for "handing the election to Clinton" (even though polls show that the number of Perot voters who would have voted for Bush if Perot wasn't in the race was pretty much identical to the number that would have voted for Clinton), but you can still draw a pretty clear line from Perot's calls for a balanced budget to the Tea Party's calls for a balanced budget. A third party vote may be a "wasted vote" in that specific election, but I think that to dismiss the idea that that vote won't have knock-on effects down the road is a short-sighted one. We can argue whether the potential future benefits of a third-party vote outweigh the potential future detriment of failing to prevent the 'other side' from winning an election; that's a valid argument to have. But to say there are no potential future benefits at all is to accept the notion that our electoral choices are limited to "terrible" and "less terrible but still bad," and I don't know that that's a notion I care to accept.
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# ? Apr 7, 2012 07:22 |
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DivineCoffeeBinge posted:Voting for the Democrats even when you're unhappy with them simply because they are the least lovely of the two major parties, however, is not exactly a winner of a move either - because doing so removes any motivation for the Dems to stop being "the less lovely party" and actually start becoming, you know, not-lovely. Al Gore would have won the election if every Nader voter in Florida had voted Gore instead. In 2004, did the Democrats move left to capture those Nader voters? No, they didn't, they nominated the more centrist option instead. If you want to support the proposition that voting third party forces a major party to shift in that third party's direction to capture votes, I'd be interested to hear examples. I don't think Perot counts because Bill was going to be a centrist Dem anyways - he was Democratic Leadership Council from the start and had always talked about balancing budgets and so forth.
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# ? Apr 7, 2012 09:12 |
edit: Can the 3rd party/alternative vote discussion please move to its own thread? Spatula City posted:So, wait, does Congress have legal standing to defend DOMA? I thought there was some dispute about whether they could even hire someone to defend it? They have the right to counsel in cases questioning the power of Congress. It's just not done much. Congressmen will send amicus briefs but generally Justice defends federal laws. UltimoDragonQuest fucked around with this message at 09:19 on Apr 7, 2012 |
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# ? Apr 7, 2012 09:14 |
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There's a fair bit of debate surrounding this in Australia at the moment as well. That it is even being debated is disghusting as far as I'm concerned. Homosexual poeple are people just like the rest of us who deserve the same rights and respect as everyone else, including among other things the right to get married. I really wish the world in general could move past this backwards biggotry and progress.
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# ? Apr 7, 2012 09:30 |
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# ? Apr 25, 2024 23:27 |
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UltimoDragonQuest posted:It's just not done much. Congressmen will send amicus briefs but generally Justice defends federal laws. Is the Justice Department going to defend DOMA? Dammit, Obama.
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# ? Apr 7, 2012 18:53 |