Blogcabin California

Admitting that their goal is to destroy domestic partnership rights–not just “protect” marriage–advocates of a California initiative constitutional amendment have selected the language they want to put on the ballot. It reads shortly and simply:

A marriage between a man and a woman shall be the only legal union that shall be valid or recognized in the State of California.

This is an alternative to language which Attorney General Bill Lockyer said would not repeal partnership rights for gays and lesbians–confirming the real motivations of the proponents–to repeal the rights gays and lesbians have gained over the past quarter century.

Those seeking to deceptively repeal gay rights in California under the veil of “marriage protection” have two new ballot measures going in to circulation.

1146. (SA2005RF0082)

Marriage. Invalidation of Domestic Partnerships. Initiative Constitutional Amendment.
Summary Date: 07/25/05 Circulation Deadline: 12/27/05 Signatures Required: 598,105
Proponents: Gail Knight, Natalie R. Williams, Mark A. Jansson, and Philip W. Kell, c/o Andrew Pugno (916) 608-3065

Amends the California Constitution to provide that a marriage between a man and a woman is the only legal union that shall be valid or recognized in California. Amendment bars domestic partnerships from being valid or recognized as legal unions in California. Summary of estimate by Legislative Analyst and Director of Finance of fiscal impact on state and local governments: Unknown, but probably not significant, fiscal effect on state and local governments. The impact would depend in large part on future court interpretations.

1147. (SA2005RF0083)

Marriage. Exclusive Legal Status for Married Spouses. Initiative Constitutional Amendment.
Summary Date: 07/27/05 Circulation Deadline: 12/27/05 Signatures Required: 598,105
Proponents: Gail Knight, Natalie R. Williams, Mark A. Jansson, and Philip W. Kell, c/o Andrew Pugno (916) 608-3065

Amends the California Constitution to provide that only a man and a woman in a lawful marriage shall have the legal status of married spouses in California. Makes same-sex marriage unconstitutional. Summary of estimate by Legislative Analyst and Director of Finance of fiscal impact on state and local governments: Unknown, but probably not significant, fiscal effect on state and local governments. The impact would depend in large part on future court interpretations.

The devil is in the details, and it is quite possible to disagree with Attorney General Bill Lockyer’s interpretation of both. Here’s what the two measures actually say:

A marriage between a man and a woman is the only legal union that shall be valid or recognized in this state.

and;

Only a man and a woman in a lawful marriage shall have the legal status of married spouses in California.

The latter measure gets the more generous Title and Summary from Lockyer–who has led court defenses of California’s current ban on marriage equality. However, in the details, it is clear that the intent is not to simply make, “same-sex marriage unconstitutional,” in California but to deny partnership rights to anyone who cannot enter into such a relationship.

Lockyer approves ballot petitions [SFGate]

When the State Attorney General released an initiative constitutional amendment to repeal civil unions and domestic partnership rights in California, it was evident that proponents of the initiative planned on hiding the truth and portraying the proposal as a means to “protect” marriage. In the email inbox comes the first evidence of said campaign strategy, from the Capitol Resource Institute.

Capitol Resource Institute has joined the Protect Marriage coalition. We support the task of placing a constitutional amendment before the voters of California to protect marriage between one man and one woman. The petition signing process to qualify a constitutional amendment will begin soon.

The Protect Marriage Coalition is a broad-based and united group who believe that marriage’s foremost purpose is the raising of healthy children in a family with a mom and a dad.

Thus far, the coalition includes over one million people represented from national, state, and local organizations, such as Focus on the Family, Capitol Resource Institute , Pacific Justice Institute, Family Research Council, Proposition 22 Legal Defense and Education Fund, California Family Alliance, Concerned Women for America, Alliance Defense Fund, Eagle Forum of California, California Family Council , Values Advocacy Council, Hispanic So. Baptist Fellowship and many individual churches throughout the state.

…Extensive and highly professional research has been conducted. The counsel of numerous organizations with decades of public policy experience has been consulted. We believe that pursuing a state constitutional marriage amendment must go forth, but carefully and prayerfully deliberated. The timing of this amendment is critical. Why? At this juncture the California courts and the legislature are against us.

They then link to a list of the “supporters” and “opponents” of the measure–but rather than mentioning the actual ballot initiative they’re asking people to sign, they link to a list of supporters and opponents of AB 849–Mark Leno’s bill to provide marriage equality in California. That’s nothing more than a lie.

You can be against gay marriage and against the ballot measure. In fact, that’s where most Californians say they are when it comes to partnership rights. The only way the far-right can win this campaign is with deception–so it’s all the more important that we speak out an educate people about that these proposals really mean.

Although its sponsors call it the “Voters’ Right to Protect Marriage“, Attorney General Bill Lockyer more appropriately names the latest Constitutional Amendment cleared for circulation in California, “Marriage. Elimination of Domestic Partnership Rights. Initiative Constitutional Amendment.”

It reads as follows:

Section 1.1 of Article I of the Constitution is added to read:

SEC. 1.1. a) Only marriage between one man and one woman is valid or recognized in California, whether contracted in this state or elsewhere.

b) Neither the Legislature nor any court, government institution, government agency, initiative statute, local government or government official shall abolish the civil institution of marriage between one man and one woman, or bestow statutory rights or incidents of marriage on unmarried persons, or require private entities to offer or provide rights or incidents of marriage to unmarried persons. Any public act, record, or judicial proceeding, from within this state or another jurisdiction, that violates this section is void and unenforceable.

Log Cabin is quick out to point out that this is an attack on mainstream California values:

“This measure would have a devastating impact on California families. It would repeal and permanently ban the existing rights, responsibilities, and protections for legally recognized Domestic Partners in California,” said Patrick Guerriero, President of Log Cabin Republicans. “These rights have been on the books at the local level for as long as 20 years in some cases. They have been supported by politicians in both parties and have been upheld as constitutional by Republican judges at the Superior, Appellate, and Supreme Court level.”

…“This Constitutional Amendment has nothing to do with protecting marriage. This amendment seeks to radically roll back basic protections for California families,” said Jeff Bissiri, California Director of Log Cabin. “During the campaign for Proposition 22, proponents repeatedly asserted that it was not an effort to deny domestic partner benefits. Now we know they were lying. This amendment would marginalize gay and lesbian families in California. It’s mean-spirited and runs counter to our state’s inclusive history,” continued Bissiri.

If approved it would mean, for example, that the City and County of San Francisco could not offer Domestic Partner benefits to its employees, that West Hollywood could not allow a couple with a civil union to move in together under their Rent Stabilization Ordinance, or that the UCLA Hospital could not allow visitation rights to a domestic partner. How, exactly, would any of that “protect” marriage?

The Los Angeles Chapter of the Log Cabin Republicans threw their annual pool party today in the Hollywood Hiils. Here’s what you missed.

LCR California Director Jeff Bissiri and Redondo Beach Mayor Mike Gin…

Carpenteria City Councilman Greg Granlund with Angel and Korey…

Somehow, this shirt made me think of the new Buffalo Nickel…

More guests from the OC and the TO…

LCR CA Chair Terry Hamilton and Frank Monteleone.

On Wednesday night, as I attended the Central Committee meeting of the Republican Party of Los Angeles County, my worst fears were confirmed–the Special Election called by Arnold Schwarzenegger was being cast as a partisan issue.

“Republicans will benefit from redictricting,” we were told. “Democrats will be the big losers if paycheck protection passes,” another continued.

If that is the message that voters hear between now and November, the ballot box will be as bloddy as the last chapters of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

No, what voters need to hear is talk about the issues on the ballot, so that they don’t think this election is partisan warfare but something which affects peoples’ lives.

Prop 75, for example, will allow teachers and nurses, not their union bosses, to determine whether they want their paychecks spent on political ads or, say, classroom supplies.

Prop 76 will give more control to our elected officials to make sure that Sacramento doesn’t spend more money than it takes in.

…and so on. If the battle is Democrat versus Republican, the numbers are not in favor of the Governor’s reform agenda. But if each of us can convince a few Democrat friends that just one of the reform initiatives is worthy of their vote, the differences in Party registration will melt away. But we have to start talking about the issues–not the politics–to win the hearts and minds of our fellow Californians.

Initiatives Qualified for the November 8, 2005, Special Statewide Election Ballot [SoS]

When Canada made marriage equality the law this week, the Province of Alberta was the last holdout in granting the rights to rites. But demand for the new right is slow to materialize:

On the first day that gays and lesbians in this conservative Canadian province could get a license to marry, just five same-sex couples did so.

But this province is known as the Bible Belt of Canada and is the only one in the famously liberal nation that celebrates family values with an official holiday.

Canada on Wednesday became just the fourth country in the world to allow same-sex marriages, but many in Alberta simply aren’t ready to accept so radical a notion. Eight of the nation’s 10 provinces and one of its three territories have in recent years allowed gays and lesbians to marry, but most people in Calgary, which culturally is closer to the red states of the American heartland than the progressive cities of Toronto and Vancouver, are only grudgingly following suit.

Yet somehow, the sky has not fallen…

Closeted gay community of Alberta still avoiding altar [SFGate]

Ignore your local alt-weekly paper at your own peril. In the end, the OC Weekly exposed a scam putting AIDS patients’ lives at risk in Laguna Beach.

Following an OC Weekly investigation that spanned six stories and two years, the U.S. Attorney indicted a Laguna Beach physician on charges he injected AIDS patients with bogus drugs.

Dr. George Steven Kooshian and his nurse, Virgil Opinion, committed “conspiracy, 25 counts of health-care fraud and three counts of making false statements relating to health-care matters,” said Cindy Lozano, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office…

Except for metroG.com, a gay Orange County website, which republished Moxley’s articles, the local press was almost silent. The LA Times wrote nothing. Two weeks after Moxley’s first story, the Register wrote its first and only article on the subject, which included a statement from Kooshian: “I think there are other motives behind this. I don’t believe that we did anything I think is wrong.”

It was a curiously worded denial, and one might have expected local reporters to jump on it. Instead, The Orange County & Long Beach Blade, the Laguna Beach-based monthly gay magazine in which Kooshian regularly advertised his medical practice, ran a July 2002 ad with Kooshian attacking the Weekly as a paper “lacking in journalistic integrity and objectivity.” He described himself as “a concerned and caring physician” who had been victimized by “unethical and inappropriate” reporting.

“You guys have a lot more flexibility and freedom than we do,” said Blade publisher Bill LaPointe, explaining his magazine’s continuing support of Kooshian on the day the indictments came down. “I can’t just go out and publish rumor and innuendo.”

“Kooshian endangered the lives of his HIV/AIDS patients for several years while the local GLBT [gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered] print media failed to report this important story,” said Bill Brown, publisher of metroG.com. “If it weren’t for the Weekly covering the Kooshian story—while allowing metroG to use their coverage—many affected people would be unaware of a possible problem concerning their health and even their lives.”

While tragic, there is a lesson here about the value of distributed journalism–with more voices chasing more stories–and we’ll likely see these kinds of situations exposed more often as the Blogosphere grows.

Dr. K KO’d [OC Weekly]

Acting as if they had just touched the hot potatoe, five members of the Cook County, Illinois, Board of Commissioners pulled their names off a resolution supporting the City’s 2006 Gay Games:

The Illinois Family Institute is urging Democratic commissioners to do the same.

“There’s a big difference between tolerating and celebrating homosexuality,” said Peter LaBarbera of the group. “For governments to be using taxpayer money and big corporations spending money to sponsor this, we think the average Joe sees that as being just a little bit off.”

The Cook County Board of Commissioners approved the ceremonial proclamation without opposition last month as one of a group of routine measures.

“I must have been out of the room” when the proclamation came up, said Tony Peraica, one of the five Republicans on the 17-commissioner board.

Organizers say the Gay Games, set for July 2006, could pump $50 million to $80 million into Chicago’s economy.

Three years ago, I was in Toronto for Pride when Conservative then-Mayor Mel Lastman embraced the festivities–after all, it was bringing in millions of dollars to the City in tourism and entertainment revenues–a twoonie was still a twoonie no matter who was putting it the government’s coffers. A good lesson for conservatives South of the Border as well.

Chicago Politicians Divided on Gay Games [SFGate]

I was there last night and concur with the other bloggers that Eric Siddall stood head and shoulders above the rest at the LA County Republican Party’s “Board of Equalization Night” (I know, I could have been reading Harry Potter)…

Eric W. Siddall could be the new young face the California Republican Party needs to become competitive again in the State’s urban centers. Siddall is seeking the Republican nomination for the obscure tax administration board’s 4th district – a traditionally “safe” Democratic seat covering most of Los Angeles County. But Wednesday he outlined a compelling case for L.A. Democrats to consider a Republican.

“Who do you trust with your taxes?” Siddall asked. “A Republican or a Democrat?”

Indeed, the Board of Equalization is the one place where being a Conservative means that you’ve got a “bleeding heart”…it’s the nation’s only elected tax collection agency and it’s a surprise that more Republicans don’t get elected, were it not for gerrymandering.

Despite the fact that the Fourth District (LA County) is heavily Democrat, Siddall showed that if any of the three candidates running for the office could win in November, it would be Eric Siddall…and I am not saying that just because my Stonewall neighbor offered to put his campaign poster in his apartment, provided it had a headshot.

ONE TO WATCH: Fresh-Faced Republican Eric Siddall Seeks Seat on Elected State Tax Board [Matt Szabo]
Equalize This! Siddall takes on establishment, promises reform in campaign launch [BfT]