Looks like all the pressure on El Coyote has paid off for LA local supporters of marriage equality, according to Frontiers magazine:

Christoffersen created a firestorm of controversy for the 77-year-old L.A. institution after local blogs broke the news she had donated $100 to the Yes on Proposition 8 campaign. Long a popular destination for the LGBT community for its cheap Mexican food and generous Margaritas, El Coyote found itself the target of boycotts and demonstrations after Christoffersen’s donation went public. In a press conference hosted by the restaurant days after the news of the donation broke, Christoffersen tried to explain her donation did not have to do with animus for gay and lesbian people, but was instead tied to her Mormon faith. Christoffersen did not apologize for the donation and did not indicate she would support any No on 8 organization. Boycott organizers and demonstrators were not impressed, and have argued online and in the local news media that Christoffersen’s support for the ban of same-sex marriage was reason to shun El Coyote.

Schoeppner said Christoffersen tended her resignation to her mother, Grace Salisbury, who is described on the El Coyote Web site as the “matriarch” of the restaurant. Salisbury’s sister-in-law founded El Coyote in 1931.

All the week’s briefs that are fit to tweet:

Fashion

• watching men’s winter 2008-2009 fashion shoe. All models are dark blonds with high boots, long messy hair, eye liner, & sashes with medals. #

Travel

• on board SouthWest for Palo Alto! Big day up & back training people how to do TOAs with new application. #
• landed in San José Grabbing cab to Palo Alto for quickie mandatory meal break & non mandatory omlette & Starbucks before morning training. #
• had a dream this morning about a friend who was seeing the whole world, westwards, so Los Angeles was her first stop. Good seeing her again! #

Marriage Equality

• reading about California Senate, Assembly Resolutions Against Proposition 8 http://tinyurl.com/59uyga #
• lining up at SouthWest in San Jose after working in Palo Alto. Homeward bound to Los Angeles! Busy day, good times. #

Around Town

• saw a 50 something guy in a yamulke walking down the middle of Melrose between June & Highland on his cell phone. Walker can you hear me? #

Battlestar Galactica / TV / Heroes / Around Town / Celebrity / TV

• BSG fans: Katee Sackhoff is on Law & Order tonight on NBC! And don’t forget: BSG returns to Sci Fi January 16th! youwillknowthetruth.com #
• leaving downtown Los Angeles & heading back to West Hollywood. Early start means early finish for once! #
• poster on the Los Angeles subway for Zagat’s new mobile site feautures the BlackBerry Bold. I feel so out of date. And underfed! zagat.mobi #
• reading: CNN – O.J. Simpson to go to prison. About time! #
• just saw Zachary Quinto from Heroes at the Arclight using his in real life super powers to slide down the bannister. He was a fun waiter. #

Nightlife

• chillaxing with a martini glass that’s half full. Can’t wait until it’s fully not full! The holiday season of drinking has begun! #
• at the Los Angeles CD release party for Circus by Brittany in West Hollywood. Not a fan but vibe is interesting. #
• at Hollywood & Highland for the morning commute. Grown man on scooter. Disturbing somehow. #

Blogosphere

• at ILTA trainer meeting. Speaker is from BigLaw 2.0 — he also has an Unclaimed Persons Facebook group. #
• today I received an email from Utterli.com — they have better imports to Pownce. Ten days before Pownce goes offline forever. Ironically. #

Technology / Gaming

• looking for a secret Santa gift for a World of Warcraft fan. Has to be polite enough for office giving. Ideas, anyone? I’m a n00b. #
• at office holiday party hoping my number comes up for the two raffles. Wish me luck! Or more free drinks! #
• drinking last drink of the night. Listening to a fun remix of “You Can’t Stop the Beat” from the cinema adaption of the Broadway musical Hairspray. #
• thinking that Sprint’s new phone called the Rant has a very unfortunate name. What’s next? The BlackBerry Tantrum? #
• finishing breakfast in West Hollywood before heading to Arclight Cinema Hollywood to see Twighlight. Might be Twink Lite but looking forward to it! #

Shopping / Fiction

• went on a mini binge at Borders: bought the 3rd & 4th Sookie Stackhouse novels & Twighlight in paperback. Vamps are us! #
• OH: meet “James, the abs model. His fitness calender is available inside.” Only in Los Angeles. #

Marketing / Environment

• just saw an ad against clean coal technology. http://www.ThisIsReality.org — very weird ad. Trying to be ironic but just kinda dumb. #

Politics

• thinking how tired Obama looked at Meet the Press. He looks like he’s aged after winning as much as Bush has his whole presidency. #

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I’m sort of stealing this concept from KipEsquire (as I do many links lately).  He calls the feature “comment left elsewhere.  I thought it would be nice to have my own archive here if the comment is one relating to something I usually blog about, this time made on Trust, But Verify which is almost everything I remember about Ronald Reagan’s presidency as a child.  The full text of my comment below the jump.

The reason why the states are not uniform is because they all have their own constitutions.

The recent Connecticut decision looked at similar state constitutional questions, and reviewed all of the sister state precedents.

The CT court decided that the NY dissenting opinion on their marriage equality case was logical and used the correct application of scrutiny, etc. and that California also followed the correct procedure.

So they considered both CT and US federal case law that had guidelines for determining, and most states failed to use the correct criteria correctly.

Also, the CA Supreme Court only recognizes rational basis review and strict scrutiny; the US Supreme Court has been criticized for its case law on intermediate scrutiny.  There’s no equivalent in CA.

CT, meanwhile, does, and they made their decision on that basis.

I’m not sure if the current petitions for a writ are a first impression case.

The Official Proponents of Proposition 8 (as they are identified in court proceedings) are arguing so far that the Proposition 8 opponents are relying on “novel” interpretations and arguments.

Lambda Legal, on the other hand, mentioned in their recent conference call that there are 9 examples in case law to strike down an amendment as a revision.  6 failed, and 3 won.  They will argue that the cases with similarity to theirs should prevail, which would make 4/10 or almost half of such cases favorable for petitioners.

[Image from the catalog for a cool gift item for lawyers.]