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Lots of criticism of S.F. Mayor Gavin Newsom today, from the usual suspects (the American Family Association want to send him to prison for “up to 300 years”–though at the rate of 3 years per marriage poor Gavin is up to 7500 years in the slammer by now), and at least one not-so-usual suspect:

“I was sorry to see the San Francisco thing go forward,” said Frank, a gay congressman from Massachusetts who shared his concerns with San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom as the city prepared to begin marrying gays and lesbians last week.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Frank also expressed concern that the image of lawlessness and civil disobedience in San Francisco would pressure some in Congress to support a federal constitutional amendment banning gay unions.

Frank said he and other gay marriage advocates had hoped that the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court’s ruling that same-sex couples have the right to marry would serve as a national model for orderly, legal protection of gay marriage.

I think Frank has a very specific fear in mind. Governor Romney has started making noises about finding a way to defy the Supreme Judicial Court’s order to issue marriage licenses to gay couples in…I don’t know how many days, now.

My guess is that there are too many parallels, in Frank’s eyes, between what Newsom is doing and what Romney may do.

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The Indianapolis Star is following up on a classic, election year non-story story: Who will be the Democratic Vice Presidential candidate? Unsuprisingly, the Star is touting Senator Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) as a top choice. Here’s the Star’s case (Take note that the Star’s case is based almost entirely on the musings of Larry Sabato, “a political analyst and professor at the University of Virginia”):

There are, Sabato said, lots of potential candidates for vice president, “but there aren’t many who can actually help.”

Bayh, Sabato said, could be dispatched to campaign in only three states — Indiana, Ohio and West Virginia, all carried by Bush in 2000.

“If (Bayh) turns those states,” Sabato said, “no way Bush can win. It’s literally over.”

. . . .

“Having Evan on the national ticket would very likely make a difference in whether Indiana voted for the Democratic nominee for president or not,” said Gov. Joe Kernan [D], who’s running in November for his first full term as governor. But Kernan added: “It’s not a gimme.”

As mentioned in these (virtual) pages, Indiana has been trending Democratic of late. Once a solid “red” state, with Bayh on the ticket it could conceivably end up Blue. But, contrary to Sabato, Bayh’s effects in Ohio and West Virginia really can’t be known. It may amaze you, but Ohio is not Indiana is not Iowa is not Kansas. And Indiana is especially not West Virginia.

There is a common demoninator, though (aside from the flat accents): Voters in each of these states tend to be moderates.* And nothing turns off a moderate voter like the perception of extremism.

A reason for Bush to soften his image, I think, and not to make a divisive “Marriage Amendment” plank #1 of his national campaign. And a pretty damn good reason for Northeasterner Kerry to choose Bayh as his VP, in my humble opinion.

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. . . . I say hello, and it’s goodbye again.”

I’m beyond busy at work, but I did want to comment on the Thirteenth. Consider this your unlucky open thread.

(Speaking of unluck, I turn thirty tomorrow. Big party planned: I’ll wake up at 7 a.m., sit down in front of my computer, and write legal arguments ‘tll nightfall. Livin’ la vida loca, baby.)

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I ought not to be posting this–I am dead serious about going on hiatus. But everyone in my state and especially at my school is talking about this gay marriage debate today, and I see a huge story being missed.

Of all the anti-gay marriage lobbyists who have come to Massachusetts, the Family Research Council (FRC), and its President, Tony Perkins, may be the most quoted–I’ve seen him in the Washington Post, the Boston Globe, the NY Times, the Grauniad, MSNBCm all over the place. In these articles, the FRC is almost always described simply as “a conservative group” or “a conservative organization” or “the conservative Family Research Council.”

If journalists would do some background research on the FRC, they would see that this description is an insult to both gay people and conservatives.

Not all conservatives oppose gay marriage. Not all people who oppose gay marriage are homophobic. Not all homophobic people are bigots. The Family Research Council are bigots–and I do not use emotionally loaded terms like “bigot” lightly. Here are some quotations from FRC publications:

–“…one of the primary goals of the homosexual rights movement is to abolish all age of consent laws and to eventually recognize pedophiles as the ‘prophets’ of a new sexual order.” “Homosexual Activists Work to Normalize Sex With Boys,” FRC publication, July 1999.

–“”There is a strong undercurrent of pedophilia in the homosexual subculture. Homosexual activists want to promote the flouting of traditional sexual prohibitions at the earliest possible age….they want to encourage a promiscuous society – and the best place to start is with a young and credulous captive audience in the public schools.” – Robert Knight, Family Research Council

–“homosexuals are included in a list of sinners, who, if unrepentant, will not inherit the kingdom of God.” – Family Research Council press release about Matt Shepard’s funeral, on the day of the funeral, October 16, 1998

–After Matthew Shepard’s death, Frank Rich wrote an article saying that anti-gay groups like the FRC–I think he singled them out because they had a press conference about converting away from homosexuality around the time Shepard was found–saying they bore some responsibilty for what happened. “[FRC Spokesperson Heather] Farish vehemently rejects such allegations. ‘Don’t blame AA because a drunk was beat up,’ she said.” (Dallas Morning News article, “Why now? Other gays have been victims of brutal attacks, but the slaying of a Wyoming student has caused a national outcry,” by Brooks Egerton, October 17, 1998.)

–If you think the above quotations take their words out of context, you can read this 32 page “study” of “Homosexual Behavior and Pedophilia” by Robert Knight and Frank York. Learn all about homosexual activists’ “long term goal” of “gaining access to children”, despite the fact that they “publicly disassociate themselves from pedophiles as part of a public relations strategy”; learn how the American Psychiatric Association is in on it, etc.
(Knight is now with Concerned Women for America, but was with the FRC when this came out and they are still quite happy to quote him on their website. They also say he is one of the draftsmen of DOMA–I just hope to God that’s not true.)

–In case you think that was the “bad old days” but now they’ve changed–the FRC still offers talking points (their phrase, not mine) on the connection between homosexuality and pedophelia on their website.

–As I noted in this post, the Family Research Council helped convince President Bush to launch “Marriage Protection Week” last October. It just so happened to begin on the five year anniversary of Matthew Shepard’s death.

–Tony Perkins, the current President of the FRC, seems more telegenic and politically savvy than his predecessors but I don’t see any evidence that he’s less homophobic. In this newsletter he states, “Nor is it “loving” to suppress evidence that homosexual behavior is a “death-style” that is sending young people to an early grave.”

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Here is the latest on the Plame game. Courtesy of the Washington Post:

A federal grand jury has questioned one current and one former aide to President Bush, and investigators have interviewed six others in an effort to discover who revealed the name of an undercover CIA officer to a newspaper columnist, sources involved in the case said yesterday.

. . . .
Several sources involved in the leak case said the questioning suggests prosecutors are preparing to seek testimony from Novak and perhaps other journalists. “There’s a very good likelihood they’re going to litigate against journalists,” one source said.

It is a real investigation, and it is continuing. Moreover, the fact that a grand jury has been impaneled indicates that the decision to prosecute will mostly be in the hands of our fellow citizens — not the Justice Department or the prosecutors assigned to the case. (Of course, the Grand Jury will only see and hear the evidence that the prosecutors can muster.)*

I’ll admit to mixed feelings at this point. On one hand, nothing annoys me more than self-identified superpatriots — except for, I suppose, self-identified superpatriots who expose CIA agents for political gain. On the other hand, however, the suggestion that the prosecution may start “litigat[ing] against journalists” sends shivers down my spin. Though I occasionally find Bob Novak a bit creepy (it’s the eyebrows), I hardly want him subpoenaed and possibly thrown in jail for protecting a source.

Indeed, protecting confidential journalistic sources isn’t just yippity-do-dah liberal crap; it’s vital to the newsgathering process. Sure, it gets abused. Everything that happens in secret eventually does. (Lesson applicable to the Guantanamo detainees, I note.) Without confidential sources, however, more than a few important stories would never have seen the light of day.

So: continue the investigation. (And when do we get to the Vice President’s office?) But don’t subpoena Bob. The exposure of a semi-retired CIA agent (who, it turns out, is a bit of a publicity hound once freed from the shackles of secrecy) isn’t worth it. If we went subpoena-happy every time confidential information got leaked (and that’s the rule you’d be endorsing by subpoenaing Novak, if consisistency matters to you), Washington journalists would spend all their time in court.

The ends, I’m told, don’t always justify the means.

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Mickey Kaus passes along the rumor that, if nominated, Kerry may pick Evan Bayh as his running mate. Why? Because Bayh may win Indiana for Kerry:

kf hears semi-reliably that Kerry’s polling shows that Edwards on the ticket doesn’t win any states for Kerry, even in the South–while Evan Bayh does win Indiana (which is hard to believe, Indiana being a pretty Republican state). … Might as well go after him, John!

Actually, Indiana is probably more in play this election cycle than it ever has been. Once a reliably Republican state (outside of the college towns of Lafayette/West Lafayette and Bloomington, and the Chicago suburbs of Gary and Hammond), it has been trending steadily Democratic of late.* It’s current Democratic governor, Joe Kernan, is popular — and a solid favorite over his high-profile GOP opponent, former Bush Budget Director Mitch Daniels.** Indianapolis, once a Republican stronghold, easily re-elected its Democratic mayor and has elected a majority-Democratic City Council for the first time in living memory. (A slight exaggeration, but not by much.) Democrats even expect to pick up a seat or two in the Indiana legislature.

Losing Indiana won’t cost Bush the election in and of itself. But, if once-solid Indiana’s looks to be in play, what does it say about perennially-on-the-fence Ohio? Or Illinois, for that matter?

p.s. Is it too late to call off my bet with Harley? I took Bush for a fifth of Beefeater Gin, him ABB for a fifth of Vodka (brand escapes me).

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I shall be brief:

1. John Edwards is Clinton in ’92 — charismatic Southern, moderate, handsome, populist — but without “bimbo eruptions.” I’ll be the last to say it: Edwards is the Democrat most likely to beat Bush. (But consider: Edwards is so good on his feet, anything less than total victory in a debate with Bush will be considered as “below expectations.”)

2. Richard Cheney is Spiro Agnew. It’s as much an image problem as anything else.* Take another look at his picture with Pope John Paul, for instance. Were this a Hollywood movie, would there be any doubt that Cheney is a “bad man”?

3. George Bush needs to mimic Ronald Reagan even more. For example, look again at how Bush enters a room to speak. Bush has the quick, bent forward stride of someone one step shy of a public-speaking phobia. Reagan, on the other hand, was completely at ease — a natural. C’mon, George: you’re the leader of the free world. Slow down.

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There’s a long, proud tradition of really negative campaigning in the final hours before a primary–anonymous flyers attacking the other candidates, that sort of thing. My sense is that every campaign does it (including my preferred candidate and Handsome Larry*, who’s (accurately) perceived to have run the most positive campaign.) Every campaign is “shocked” at their rivals’ dirty tricks and indignantly denies its own–until they’re caught, in which case it’s portrayed, truly or falsely, as a one-time mistake by an overzealous volunteer.

But there’s negative campaigning, and there’s negative campaigning. These had better be isolated incidents.

1. From an AP story:

For example, Carson said, an e-mail that proposes to be from campaign manager Joe Trippi asks for interns, but then says because of tight sleeping headquarters, homosexuals are not accepted.

Frances Gehling, a Dean volunteer, said she received a phone call January 16 from a person who identified herself as a Londonderry, N.H., resident who worked for the local Kerry campaign. After Gehling said she supported Dean, the caller asked if it bothered Gehling “that Dean waffles on the issues.”

The caller then asked Gehling about Dean’s statement that “we will learn how to talk about Jesus” when he campaigns in the South. “She asked how someone who is married to a Jew and raising Jewish children can have Christian values,” Gehring said when contacted by The Associated Press.

2. There have been reports that people were calling voters in the middle of the night–4.a.m., say–in New Hampshire pretending to be from the Dean campaign. Atrios summarizes them here.

3. There were rumors on Kos of attacks on Dean’s wife and other, even nastier push polls (would it change your opinion on Dean to know that he was an abortitionist, his history of spousal abuse, etc.) in Iowa, and a recording of a Kerry volunteer calling Dean an “environmental racist.” I didn’t take these very seriously at the time, but these reports have a cumulative effect.

If these reports are true (and I think most are, except maybe the rumors about the abortionist/spousal abuse push polls, which are not well sourced and so ridiculously sleazy that I find them hard to believe), and if they are an organized effort rather than a few wacko volunteers (which is much less clear) we still don’t know who’s responsible. It could be any Democratic candidate, or even a Republican trying to sow discord. My knee jerk reaction and that of many Dean supporters, though, was “it’s probably the Kerry campaign.” I’m sure that’s partly sour grapes, but it’s also partly Occam’s razor. Most of the stories that are confirmed involve the Kerry campaign; Kerry participated in both Iowa and NH; and he was the one most likely to gain if Dean was damaged.

In any case, it needs to stop.

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One of the things that bothered me most about David Brooks’ ridiculous assertions about “neocon” being a code word for “Jew” is that it makes it harder to point out true code words. And if you don’t believe they exist, read this passage from a recent National Review article.

For years, the far Left has had its own rhetoric, in which certain words carry special meanings to those “in the know.” Now, conservatives have their own way of conveying messages that have unique significance for them. In the State of the Union address, Christians heard special messages that were conveyed with skillfully placed words. For believers, the “sanctity” of marriage is rooted in those biblical principles that sustain marriage; defining marriage through its “moral tradition” carries specific ramifications in terms of Judeo-Christian values and beliefs.

Two comments:
1. Of course, pretending that code words used to be the sole province of the far Left-with-a-capital-L is absurd. “States rights” and “our Southern way of life” are the two examples that immediately come to my mind.*

2. “Judeo-Christian values and beliefs”, huh? I appreciate it that Judaism has made it to the in-club of religions. But considering that most of the Boston-area Jewish community recently “voted overwhelmingly to endorse same-sex marriage,” and that
Reform Judaism (the largest Jewish denomination in the U.S.) “determined in 2000 that gay unions were ‘worthy of affirmation through appropriate Jewish ritual.'”….I wish that Ms. Crouse and her pals would leave “Judeo” out of it.

(And while we’re on this topic, isn’t Concerned Women for America itself due for a name change?)

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From this Salt Lake Tribune article about Kurdish bootlegging from Iraq to Iran?

That’s right, what’s missing is any indication that the CDA, the American military or the Provisional Council give a flying leap about this. Indeed, this particular version of the article includes text omitted from the SLT, for some odd reason:

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The ancient punishment of banishment is alive and well among certain Indian tribes:

[A] growing number of tribes across the country, desperate to slow the wounds of drug and alcohol abuse, gambling, poverty and violence, have used banishment in varying forms in the last decade. Tribal leaders see this ancient response, which reflects Indian respect for community, as a painful but necessary deterrent.

. . . .

The rate of alcohol-related deaths among Indians was seven times that of the national average in 2002, according to the latest data from Indian Health Services, an agency within the United States Department of Health and Human Services.

. . . .

“It’s out of desperation,” said Doug George-Kanentiio, who is a journalist for News From Indian Country, a national newspaper, and a member of the six nations of Iroquois, some of which imposed banishments. “The leadership is caught in a very awkward position, and they have to make a choice. They could either reinforce the ancestral discipline, or they go the American route, which has proven to be a failure.”*

This isn’t something that many non-Native Americans like to focus on, but American Indian policy is in dire need of reformation. Simply pouring “more money” on the problem ain’t gonna cut it. What needs to be confronted is the growing abyss between the haves and have-nots of Indian tribes.

The “haves” tend to be clustered on the coasts, within an easy drive of large urban centers. Take, for instance, the Foxwoods Casino near Stonington, CT — ideally located within driving distance of New York, Boston, Hartford, and Providence. The Foxwoods (which, by the by, is this gaudy pink thing smack in the middle of an idyllic forest) fills the Pequot reservation and has a yearly revenue of about $1 billion. It’s safe to assume that the 270-or-so members of the Mashantucket Pequot are doing just fine, thank you very much.

In contrast, the have-nots — like the Lummi of Washington State — tend to find themselves in less lucrative locations, usually between the coasts, and have extraordinary poverty rates. They’re in need of targeted disbursements and the ability to exercise more local control, so that they can find local solutions for their problems. They also need to be discouraged from seeing “banishment” as an option. Shifting bodies around ain’t a solution. A banished Lummi alcoholic may no longer trouble the Lummi tribe, but he still has a problem — as do the surrounding communities and Washington State.

This isn’t a very sexy issue, but it’s an important one. Let’s try to remember it.

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