Brief Episode

So there’s some good news.  Although it’s predictable, it’s nonetheless good.  Proposition 8 supporters who donated money were denied special rights to anonymity.

It’s interesting to note that the Proposition 8 people are going to the U.S. District court to “overturn the will of the people.”  You see, the 1974 Political Reform Act was a California ballot initiative.  And the Prop 8 people are saying that the ballot initiative is unconstitutional.

Now, I believe that Prop 8 is unconstitutional as a constitutional amendment.  I’m hoping the California Supreme Court judges will agree.  But it’s so ironic that the people arguing that the voters are the ultimate judges and should dictate the rights of the minority are here arguing that no, the voters voted in 1974 for an unconstitutional law.

Proposition 8 proponents’ complaint that a California campaign-finance disclosure law has led to harassment of same-sex marriage opponents failed to sway a federal judge, who refused Thursday to throw out the law or shield donors’ names.

…

“If there ever needs to be sunshine on a particular issue, it’s a ballot measure,” U.S. District Judge Morrison England said after a one-hour hearing in his Sacramento courtroom.

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He argued that the $100 disclosure requirement – adopted by California voters in 1974 – should be struck down, modified to raise the dollar limits, or at least not applied to Prop. 8’s contributors. As a first step, Coleson said, the campaign should be exempted from the state’s post-election contribution report, due Monday.

Get that? Everyone else who donates money since 1974 in California should have their donation records publicly available, but not the Proposition 8 people.  No! They have a special right to privacy.

And who are they comparing themselves to to argue for this right?

The U.S. Supreme Court upheld campaign disclosure laws in 1976 but ruled in 1982 that the Socialist Workers Party in Ohio could shield its donors’ names because of a history of attacks and reprisals.

Protect Marriage argued that it was entitled to the same exemption because of retaliation against some of its contributors, but lawyers for the state said the two cases weren’t comparable. They noted that the Prop. 8 campaign raised nearly $30 million from 36,000 donors.

So let’s get this straight (pardon the pun).  The California Supreme Court ruled that gay, lesbian and bisexual people have historically been subject to persecution and are thus a suspect class deserving strict scrutiny for laws limiting their rights (meaning, the bar is very high for the government to justify unequal treatment).  Now, the Proposition 8 people are comparing themselves to socialists, who received an exemption from a similar law in Ohio.  Why? Because socialists have been historically persecuted in the US, so they need extra protection in the form of anonymity to participate in democracy.

I’m not so sure I agree with that (mulling it over), but that’s the rationale they gave for the exemption.

What about the Proposition 8 donors? They’re not minority group that’s been historically persecuted.  They’re part of the majority that’s donating to persecute a minority group!

[Deputy Attorney General Zackery Morazzini] noted that some of the reprisals reported by the Prop. 8 committee involve legal activities such as boycotts and picketing. Other alleged actions, such as death threats, mailings of white powder and vandalism, may constitute “repugnant and despicable acts” but can be reported to law enforcement, the judge said.

So let’s look at this again.  The Proposition 8 people allege that they’ve been threatened with illegal behavior.  But there are no lawsuits.  Compare this with the recent hate crimes in California against gay and lesbian citizens.  People are actually being found and tried, such as the gang rape suspects who targeted, kidnapped, raped and robbed and assaulted a woman who had a rainbow flag on her car in a gay neighborhood in San Francisco.

There’s no comparison.

But they still feel persecuted somehow.  Or are arguing for special rights to anonymity.

Referring to the donors whose names will appear in Monday’s public report, campaign spokesman Frank Schubert said England’s ruling “puts 1,600 people in harm’s way.”

Yes, so 1,600 people donated to strip fundamental rights from a historically persecuted minority group.  And the Prop 8 lawyers are right now arguing that 18,000 married people and their children should lose their marital and family rights and obligations — which would be a sure thing.  But the 1,600 people should become anonymous so that they might not get fake white powder or have people who don’t want to buy their goods or services.

Astounding.

[Quoting from Prop. 8 campaign can't hide donors' names]

Finally! I scoured all weekend and this morning and couldn’t find them.  The California Supreme Court now has the briefs online: Read the rest of this entry »

The story is incredible.  70 years old and pregnant.  70 years old with a newborn kid.  A first time mother.  But reading the story gets even weirder: Read the rest of this entry »

Brokeback Breakdown at the New York City Opera

The New York City Opera has canceled plans for Brokeback Mountain: The Opera:

Back in June, it was announced that Charles Wuorinen was commissioned to write an opera adaptation of the popular film Brokeback Mountain.

…

Then in September, following a meeting of New York City Opera’s Board of Directors Mortier, announced that City Opera would be commissioning Philip Glass to compose a new opera, The Perfect American which imaginatively explores the life and career of Walt Disney.

I can’t say I’m a fan of the movie.  Something about the pastoral scenes put me off after many attempts.

Nevertheless, I wonder if the opera has a chorus of singing sheep.

Information line number was swapped for phone sex line

Too funny.  And 100% true.

The Associated Press: Mich. Dems’ typo directs voters to phone-sex line

So I ran across this image in my surfing.  Harry Potter in the arm’s of Draco Malfoy.  I googled and found many, many copies of the image.  But not one credited the artist or said anything about the artist.  I kept looking and found the image was one of many.

Details and pics after the jump.  If you don’t like the image above, there’s a saying “As above, below” but probably more so.

Read the rest of this entry »

California Constitution — Please Don't Ruin It!

Some laws voted into effect by initiative have gone into effect January 1st of the next year.

I had to do some digging, and found this in the California constitution:

A proposed amendment or revision shall be submitted to the
electors and if approved by a majority of votes thereon takes effect
the day after the election unless the measure provides otherwise.

Ok.  So it’s as bad as everyone thought if Proposition 8 goes through.

Big Brother (Apple Advert)

After watching Meet the Press on my DVR, I started watching an episode of South Park on Comedy Central’s Cartman weekend I’d also recorded.

I was surprised to see an advertisement for Obama on health care with a continuum placing his plan dead center between national health care and privatization.

Lo and behold, there was an embedded add-on:  press the select buttom on the remote to view Obama’s health care plan.

I did.  And found out that on DishNetwork, Obama has an entire channel — 5890 OBAMA — on DishNetwork that runs informcials 9-5 every day.

Note how slick this is.  An embedded link with an ad.  And the ad is part of his own informercial.

So, regardless of when you’re watching your youth-skewed programming, you can see every single commercial his campaign chooses to run on the network.  And once you’ve visited the network once, you can visit it and record all of his commercials.

Although the Purple People Vote compares this to Big Brother in George Orwell’s 1984, I have to agree with Motherbrain:

… Big Brother is watching.  But it’s not those in power trying to keep the masses in line, the masses are watching and judging those in power.  Kind of cool.

Agreed.  Kinda cool.  But the Obama campaign is kinda slick.  A search finds McCain has no channel of his own.  If you think of how people can stay up all night and end up buying Thigh Masters they don’t need or will never use, an Obama channel could be pretty powerful in reaching low information voters.

Below the jump are a few good riffs on the Big Brother imagery from the original Apple ad against IBM, including the advert itself.
Read the rest of this entry »

How scarey is this to get in your In Box? Overstock.com has launched a real estate segment?

And they have one for foreclosures?

Yikes!

Overstocking for real!

To brighten your day.

Who knew that there’s such a thing as a gymnastics commedian? The inimitable Paul Hunt. Right now, he’s my favorite special Olympian.