Rhode Island Lawmakers Approve Civil Unions

[bobbyw24]

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Less than a week after same-sex marriage was legalized in New York, the Rhode Island State Senate on Wednesday evening approved a bill allowing not marriage, but civil unions for gay couples, despite fierce opposition from gay rights advocates who called the legislation discriminatory.

http://www.sanfranciscosentinel.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/constitution-gay-marriage-2.jpg

The bill, which already passed in the state’s House of Representatives and which the governor said he was likely to sign, grants gay and lesbian couples most of the rights and benefits that Rhode Island provides married couples. It was offered as a compromise this spring after Gordon D. Fox, the openly gay speaker of the Democratic-controlled House, said he could not muster enough votes to pass a same-sex marriage bill.

Gay marriage advocates initially had high hopes for success in Rhode Island this year. The new governor, Lincoln D. Chafee, an independent, had championed their cause, and Mr. Fox, who became speaker last year, also appeared eager to get a marriage bill passed. The state’s two closest neighbors, Connecticut and Massachusetts, allow gay couples to marry, as do New Hampshire and Vermont.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/30/us/30unions.html?hp

[bobbyw24]

With 13.9 million people unemployed, two million more than when Barack Obama took office, the economy is at the forefront of the 2012 campaign, already underway with a crop of GOP candidates eager to criticize president's policies.

But don't discount same-sex marriage as a potent influence on voters in this election cycle. Next year, the Supreme Court might consider the constitutionality of one section of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA, which defines marriage as the union of one man and one woman.

If the Supreme Court agreed prior to Election Day that it would consider a challenge to DOMA, that would place the marriage issue squarely in the middle of the presidential campaign.

http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/43581652/ns/politics/

[aGameOfThrones]

Privileges, privileges, privileges.

[Warrior_of_Freedom]

If only people were as passionate about peace and freedom as they were about homosexuality, we'd all be saved.

[bobbyw24]

If only people were as passionate about peace and freedom as they were about homosexuality, we'd all be saved.

I do try to sell Libertarianism to my gay friends. i tell them: you get the keep the government out of my bedroom. Just add keep the government out of my wallet and paycheck

[malkusm]

Privileges, privileges, privileges.

Exactly. Equality under the law may be noble, but it can't be the only measuring stick. We are extending the coverage of a law that has precedent -- the requirement of heterosexual couples to license their marriage in order to gain the advantages that come with it. But before extending coverage of a law to grant equality under it, we must first ask, is it a good law? The government has no business granting the privilege to marry or getting involved with private social contracts.

As another example: General Motors got a $52 billion bailout at a time when their market cap was only $7 billion. So there is now a precedent to offer safety net aid to corporations up to 740% of their total value. If we wanted to apply equality under the law, we could very easily say: "All corporations should be treated fairly and equally," and offer them all this 740% of safety net aid. However, it wouldn't make that the right course of action -- the premise of the original law must be evaluated before establishing equality under it.