06/07/2006
Gay Marriage Amendment fails in U.S. Senate: "The 49 to 48 vote fell short of the 60 votes needed to end debate, thwarting President George W. Bush and the mostly Republican senators who argued that the Constitution must be amended to prevent judges from striking down existing state-level bans on gay marriage." Republican leaders will now take the battle to the House of Representatives. Hilary Rosen on the inside story...
The Malcontent has the clip of Jon Stewart's evisceration of Bill Bennett regarding his position on gay marriage: "Jon punctures the outrageous hypocrisy in Bennett’s position, performs a stunning take-down of the polygamy argument, and puts forth the conservative logic in favor of gay marriage as a vehicle for promoting family and stability in the gay community." Also at Crooks & Liars...
Opponents of Washington state's gay civil rights laws have failed to collect enough signatures to get their hateful measure on the ballot: "Organizers of the referendum drive said they had collected 105,103 signatures, below the 112,440 minimum and considerably fewer than the 130,000 suggested to cover duplicate or invalid signatures."
NSA responds to SLDN request for information regarding surveillance of gay groups by wiretapping. Will "continue to neither confirm nor deny the existence or non-existence" of information obtained by surveillance.
Posted 11:23 AM EST by Andy Towle in Elsewhere, Gay Marriage, Military, Washington | Permalink
Like it?
Subscribe to FREE Towleroad daily headlines with our RSS feed!
RECENT STORIES:
Comments
You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.
AWESOME!!!!!
Posted by: Roy | Jun 7, 2006 11:50:55 AM
I don't know...somehow it seems a little scary that it wasn't defeated by a larger margin...if they only needed 60, they were only 11 short...it shouldn't be that close, should it?
Posted by: Michael W. | Jun 7, 2006 11:57:52 AM
The margin is scary, though I think some of the votes "for" the amendment come from spinless Senators who are actually opposed to it, but knowing it was going down to defeat anyway figured it was better not to hand their adversaries an issue to beat them with. The theory goes that if they thought the bill was close to getting the 60 votes needed to cut off debate they may have voted the other way.
Posted by: Lavi Soloway | Jun 7, 2006 12:04:49 PM
Jon Stewart is just amazing. He is eloquent, articulate and reasonable - all the qualities of a master debater (heh heh!). It's amazing how much more can be learnt from a comic than from some of the dull news reports on CNN etc.
Posted by: Keith | Jun 7, 2006 12:08:54 PM
We interrupt this program to bring you the following:
Gay Marriage Amendment Fails To Pass U.S. Senate
Now back to your regularly scheduled war.
Posted by: basis4insanity | Jun 7, 2006 12:11:01 PM
Str8 commentator and author Linda Hirshman says that “Everything I know, I learned from the Gay Movement” in her new book and on a blog post today on TAPPED (http://www.prospect.org/weblog/2006/06/post_537.html#002682).
Looks like she needs some responses to her questions at TAPPED "WHAT ARE SPERM FOR?"
Posted by: Dan Farrell Davis | Jun 7, 2006 12:11:37 PM
God, I love Jon Stewart!
Posted by: Kimmer | Jun 7, 2006 12:12:11 PM
The polygamy argument was simply brilliant! Polygamy is a CHOICE, Homosexuality is biological... he killed Bennet, and did it with gusto and humor! Bennet knew he was in trouble from the moment he sat down.
Jon Stewart for President... of The Gay Student Council!
Posted by: Wayne | Jun 7, 2006 12:29:15 PM
You know that is an amazing idea...I wonder if Jon Stewart would allow his name to be used as "advisor emeritus" or something with every gay-straight alliance at high schools and colleges?
That's the kind of interesting stuff that can come out of this kind of discussion when the wingnuts stay away out of shame.
Posted by: Brian NYC | Jun 7, 2006 12:43:08 PM
I wanted it to pass.
Imagine the backlash it would generate.
Think of the Stonewall Riots of this generation.
( Plus, it would cause a constitutional crisis because it would clash with the 14th amendment. )
Posted by: Anon | Jun 7, 2006 3:03:54 PM
Amendments require 67 votes, not 60.
Posted by: ANON II | Jun 7, 2006 3:21:41 PM
WHOA! I know I've been busy, but I didn't realize the vote was shot down! That's HUGE news! And no one seems to be talking about it!?
Posted by: Chad | Jun 7, 2006 4:31:51 PM
If the conservative right was REALLY interested in saving the sanctity of marriage and the American family, they would be writing up amendments to the Constitution banning divorce. DIvorce is the destroyer of families, not gay marriage.
Why aren't Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and Richard Dobson jumping all over THIS idea?
Posted by: zinc alloy | Jun 7, 2006 7:47:23 PM
We need to stop the religious right next election! The bible-bangers will be out in full force, no doubt!
Posted by: ROB | Jun 7, 2006 11:01:43 PM
It was never going to pass. We all knew this six hours after bush's speech on gay marriage a few years ago. They just trotted this out for politics.
Posted by: Max. | Jun 8, 2006 2:40:35 AM
As you may know, only 2 of the "bad" marriage votes were from Democrats -- 47
were from Republicans. That's the difference.
The Democratic party is worth supporting.
Posted by: Bill | Jun 8, 2006 9:00:43 AM
I agree that the Democrats are the lesser of two evils, but even our own Senetor, Hillary, has no balls when it comes to doing what is right. Jon Stewart is what keeps me sane in this unsane world. He is too bright and honest to ever run for public office.
Posted by: patrick nyc | Jun 8, 2006 11:41:15 AM
I am constantly amazed when people like Bill Bennett go on John Stewart's show. I'm glad they do because John is particularly adept at exposing the fact that their arguments, regardless of the subject, have no validity. What I find particularly interesting is how easy it was for Stewart to get Bennett to reveal his ugly inner bigot so easily. Apparently, it resides right below the surface of his personality, his and every other so-called Social Conservative for that matter. Stewart should've asked Bennett how much he'd already lost at the high stakes "Blackjack" tables in Vegas this month. What a hypocrite.
Posted by: Robert In WeHo | Jun 8, 2006 12:37:58 PM