News Briefs 12/3/2008
- New survey finds Americans evenly split on same-sex marriages, legal protections, The Desert Sun, Nicole C. Brambila. GLAAD commissioned the survey. Read the glaadBLOG post here.
- Obama opposes gay military ban, but repealing it could take a year or two, U.S. News and World Report, Amanda Ruggeri.
- Why Arizona flipped on gay marriage, CBS News, Kevin Vance. Thoroughly overshadowed by Proposition 8, this is nevertheless a fascinating article about a proposition that should never have passed in Arizona.
- Same-sex setback: Don’t blame Mormons or black voters – the California activists who tried to stop Prop 8 ran a lousy campaign, Rolling Stone, Tim Dickinson. Kate Kendall, Executive Director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights, responds here.
- Op-Ed: Will same-sex marriage be lawful? Someday, AlbertLeaTribune.com, Tim Engstrom.
Excerpts from the above headlines follow:
New survey finds Americans evenly split on same-sex marriages, legal protections
Three in four Americans favor some sort of legal recognition for gay couples although those polled are evenly divided on the issue of same-sex marriage, a new survey shows.
Conducted in the wake of California voters narrowly approving Proposition 8, which overturned a state Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage, the survey reveals the majority of Americans favor legal protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.
Obama opposes gay military ban, but repealing it could take a year or two
When it comes to President-elect Barack Obama making good on his campaign promise to repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell,” gays and lesbians—70 percent of whom voted for him—may have to be patient. Advocates of the repeal are warning that any action might take a year or more.
Why Arizona flipped on gay marriage
Arizona voters last month approved an amendment to the state constitution defining marriage as “only a union of one man and one woman”–just two years after they rejected a similar though broader amendment, making Arizona the first state in the Union to reject a ballot initiative aimed at preventing gay marriage. What happened between 2006, when Proposition 107 was narrowly rejected, and 2008, when Proposition 102 breezed through?
Evidence of entrenched homophobia and religious intolerance obscure a more difficult truth. Prop 8 should have been defeated — two months before the election, it was down 17 points in the polls — but the gay-rights groups that tried to stop it ran a lousy campaign. According to veteran political observers, the No on Prop 8 effort was slow to raise money, ran weak and confusing ads, and failed to put together a grass-roots operation to get out the vote.
Op-Ed: Will same-sex marriage be lawful? Someday
I can look you straight in the eye and tell you this: Even though same-sex marriage took a beating at the ballot box on Nov. 4, there will come a day when same-sex marriage will be allowed in every state in America.
How do I know this?
Just look at the past. America expands the rights it gives to its people, but fights for rights seem to take two steps forward and one step back. Nov. 4 was an example of one step back on the issue of same-sex marriage.
