April 2013
2 posts
March 2013
3 posts
Hollingsworth v. Perry oral arguments at the Supreme Court
I still cannot believe that people could actually go to the Supreme Court with ridiculous arguments like these:
JUSTICE BREYER: What precisely is the way in which allowing gay couples to marry would interfere with the vision of marriage as procreation of children that allowing
sterile couples of different sexes to marry would not? I mean, there are lots of people who get married who can’t have children. To take a State that does allow adoption and say — there, what is the justification for saying no gay marriage? Certainly not
the one you said, is it?
Look, you said that the problem is marriage; that it is an institution that furthers procreation.
MR. COOPER: Yes, Your Honor.
JUSTICE BREYER: And the reason there was adoption, but that doesn’t apply to California. So imagine I wall off California and I’m looking just there, where you say that doesn’t apply. Now, what happens to your argument about the institution of marriage as a tool towards procreation? Given the fact that, in California, too, couples that aren’t gay but can’t have children get married all the time.
MR. COOPER: Yes, Your Honor. The concern is that redefining marriage as a genderless institution will sever its abiding connection to its historic traditional procreative purposes, and it will refocus, refocus the purpose of marriage and the definition of marriage away from the raising of children and to the emotional needs and desires of adults, of adult couples.
Transcript: http://www.supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments/argument_transcripts/12-144a.pdf
Download: http://www.supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments/argument_audio_detail.aspx?argument=12-144
February 2013
11 posts
“The big picture is that this is a big problem that has gotten much worse quickly. Right now, there’s a general belief that because these are pharmaceutical drugs, they’re safer than street drugs like heroin. But at some point, people using these drugs are going to become more aware of the dangers”
—Did u know that most drug overdoses in the US are caused by legal drugs. So should we regulate addictive painkillers the same way we do with illegal substances? Or the other way - complete deregulation is the answer?
“I think the focus on gaffes is a deep embarrassment, like, a deep embarrassment, and a systemic failure on the media’s part,” he says. “And the danger of that is that, when you don’t tell people how a machine works, when it’s broke, they don’t know how to fix it. And I think that’s begun to happen.”
—The New Republic profiles genius kid Ezra Klein: The Wise Boy. A tale of striving and success in modern-day Washington
“But these students, and dozens of other young people interviewed here last week, give voice to a trend that is surprising pollsters and jangling the nerves of Republicans.
Young people absolutely believe that there’s a role for government. At the same time, this is not a generation of socialists. They are highly entrepreneurial, and know that some of what it takes to create an environment where they can do their own exciting, creative things is having basic systems that work.
Under-30 voters are “the only age group in which a majority said the government should do more to fix problems,” the nonpartisan Pew Research Center reported in November. Nationally, voters under 30 accounted for 19 percent of the electorate last year, up from 18 percent in 2008. These millennials are by far the most ethnically and racially diverse voter cohort; whites account for just 58 percent of them, according to the Pew center, while 76 percent of older voters are white” —
Young people absolutely believe that there’s a role for government. At the same time, this is not a generation of socialists. They are highly entrepreneurial, and know that some of what it takes to create an environment where they can do their own exciting, creative things is having basic systems that work.
Under-30 voters are “the only age group in which a majority said the government should do more to fix problems,” the nonpartisan Pew Research Center reported in November. Nationally, voters under 30 accounted for 19 percent of the electorate last year, up from 18 percent in 2008. These millennials are by far the most ethnically and racially diverse voter cohort; whites account for just 58 percent of them, according to the Pew center, while 76 percent of older voters are white” —
American Millennials are trying to win back their country. The New York Times has the profile
January 2013
20 posts
“On the way back home, I ride my bike beside her as she praises me, “Qué bien. You did great! ¡Qué macho!” and kisses my forehead. That night she makes chicken fricasé—my favorite—with extra drumsticks and olives just for me. For a moment I can almost believe she loves me, that she’ll never call me a faggot again, that she’ll let me play with my sissy Legos and watercolors. But that very night she shoos my cat Ferby off my lap: “Stop dat. You looking like una niña sitting there petting dat thing. Why don’t you like dogs?” Apparently, I have the wrong pet, too”
—Inauguration Poet reveals the deeply moving story about his homophobic Grandmother
