L8er H8ers

With apologies for the headline.

In San Francisco today, Chief US District Judge Vuaghn Walker officially overturned the controversial Proposition 8. For those of you with short attention spans, Prop 8 was the gay marriage ban enacted in California during the 2008 elections.

"Proposition 8 fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license," Walker wrote in his decision. "Indeed, the evidence shows Proposition 8 does nothing more than enshrine in the California Constitution the notion that opposite-sex couples are superior to same-sex couples.

-excerpt from CNN

The campaign to pass Proposition 8 featured every dirty political trick from rhetoric to outright lies. It was better funded than any political campaign for a social issue in our nation’s history. It was a mar on the reputation for fairness and tolerance that America has prided itself on for generations, and although I am not gay, I am ecstatic to hear of its defeat, however temporary.

Because it is expected that a higher court will rule on this, the matter effectively remains undecided, and so the Judge has ruled that the ban will continue to hold until the appeals process is concluded- a process that may very well wind up in the Supreme Court in the not-too-distant future.

That’s right, there is a strong likelihood that the Supreme Court will be forced to decide whether homosexuality is a protected status under the 14th amendment before our next presidential election.

In other words, depending on how a certain other popular-vote initiative pans out in November, California may be giving rise to two potentially epic Supreme Court issues before Christmas.

And as an interesting aside: in the corner of gay rights during this legislative smackdown is the unlikely tag-team of David Boies and former US Solicitor General Theodore Olson, the lawyers that represented Al Gore and George Bush in the 2002 elections, respectively. The law guy that the Democrats turned to in hopes of winning the presidency and the man that the Republicans turned to for the same are working together on this. It’s like when Lex Luthor teamed up with Superman to fight Darkseid.


But political fanboying aside, today made me happy. It’s a reminder that while we still have an abundance of grossly ignorant, intolerant jackasses in our country, there’s still a strong contingent of sensible people willing to push back. A certain somebody would be very quick to remind me of how ridiculous I sound when I get on my political high horse, but this is one position that I don’t mind looking silly over.