I feel a little bad today. While I have enjoyed the six years I’ve been married to my wife, and I love our precious baby girl, this morning at approximately 7:15 AM I voted against protecting marriage from the heathens that want to destroy it.
You see, gay marriage is already illegal in Texas (since 2003), but it turns out it wasn’t illegal enough, so it was decided that we need to amend the state constitution just in case some “activist judge” decides to change the law somewhere in the future and ruin everything. We’re already 49th in the nation for marriages staying together. Surely were gay marriage allowed we’d plummet all the way to 50th.
So why vote against it? Way back when I was 18 I had to register to vote for the first time. I remeber the options clearly:
Republican
Communist
Klan Member
Snake Handler
Democrat
Contrarian
Ok, actually I voted against it for several reasons. Not the least of which being ** that it’s already freaking illegal!!!** I’m so glad everything in this state is so peachy keen that we have time to deal with stuff like sexy cheerleading and making gay marriage illegaler. :rolleyes:
I made sure to vote today, too, so I could vote against it. I’m sure we’re fighting an uphill battle, but I sure as hell didn’t want it to pass without at least doing my part.
I get to vote for a dog’sbreakfast of propositions, some of which Ah-nold is pushing. I think I’ll back the redistricting measure, and maybe one of the union ones, then vote no on all the ones I don’t understand.
The people in Massachusetts, Alaska, and Hawaii might have made similar arguments. In each state, courts DID, in fact, change the law and find that gay marriage was required by the state constitution. In Alaska and Hawaii, voters approved a state constitutional measure to reverse this; in Massachusetts, amending the constitution requires multiple years, and a vote last year in favor of reversing the court’s decision was not followed up by a simialr vote this year.
Now, of course, Texas’ courts are perhaps more reliably conservative than Massachusetts’ courts. But it’s very disingenuous to roll your eyes and say this measure is completely redundant because gay marriage is already illegal, when you know, or should know, that forbidding it at the constitutional level is quite different than merely legislating against it.
Don’t get me wrong: I think this measure is unwise, foolish, and wrong.
Are judges in those states elected? I think the fact that Texas judges are reliably conservative, accountable to the voters, and working under an all-Republican state supreme court makes the possibility of the family code statute getting overturned nonexistant.
Serious question: If you don’t understand something that’s on the ballot, why not just abstain and not vote one way or the other? Please explain this to me.
While I can’t disagree, Bricker, I’m thinking of engaging in some complexly reasoned debate on the issue so that you’ll get so busy with it that you’ll forget to vote today.
Well, maybe you vote “no” because that means nothing will change if they don’t pass. Personally, I abstained from those I didn’t research or understand.
Of course, I don’t have Arnold puting anything on my ballet.
Well, Slacker, it may surprise you to learn that the DMN* officially came out against Prop 2, and there’s been something of a buzz against it in other media. Maybe, just maybe, it will fail.
Hey, and if you’re actually in the City of Dallas itself, like I am, you have fourteen more fun and exciting propositions!! From Prop 1 (the “stronger mayor but not as strong as the prop rejectect last December” prop) to Prop 14 (allocating funds for a homeless shelter). And those are the exciting props, people. Bleah, what an election.
DMN = Dallas Morning News for you ferriners out there.
I know, and actually - it seems about every major newspaper in the state is against it as well. I’m not confident though, because if churches all over the state were handing out flyers about Prop 2 like mine did on Sunday (my pastor heard from me about that one), the response from the conservative crowd could be substantial.
LOL - I live in Plano actually, so I don’t get to share the fun there. Can’t wait to hear the results though!*
*Yes I can
Because abstaining, if it passes, means you may end up paying taxes for something you don’t agree with and didn’t vote for. A no vote means no matter what, you won’t be paying for something you don’t agree with.
In the past few years, I have begun to realize that I am becoming a Libertarian. I vote NO on just about everything. And I like it that way. Especially on Ahnold’s stupid ideas.
In California, we have a measure requiring the parents of minors to be notified before having an abortion. Great, let’s just legislate ourselves back to the stone ages and force young girls to cross state lines or try illegal abortions and die from infections or bleeding or poison. Not to mention go through who knows what to get the money to do so. Great idea.
What they said. Plus, Props 78 & 79 are competing drug initiatives, and both are impossible to figure out. So…no. If the authors of the initiative can’t write something that a high school teacher can understand, they are up to something and must be stopped!
I voted against EVERYTHING this morning. The only thing I could have voted for might have been a ballot initiative to fire Arnold for foisting this unnecessary crap-fest on us in the first place.
I agree - and with no smily. I’m completely serious.
These people are supposed to represent us. We delegate power to them, to work on our behalf.
Thus, it is their duty to make it accessible to us. If I can’t understand it, you are certainly not doing it on my behalf. If you want my support, have enough respect to make sure I understand it!
Accessible government may be a pipe dream, but it’s my vote and I don’t want to give it unless I’m confident that it’s the right thing to do.
Sure. I can’t remember the specific details right now, but during the '03 recall campaign there had been some discussion of whether the replacement governer would be immune from recall. Only for some four or six months was the answer, if I’m remembering rightly.
But it’s hardly worth the trouble at this point. I didn’t even want to be having this election today; it wouldn’t have made sense to support an election I don’t want to try to achieve a recall we weren’t going to get…
To counteract the idiots who vote the way the TV tells them to. Also, because the law of unintended consequences is much more in force for initiatives. There’s no legislative review of the law, and if you fuck it up, it takes another popular vote to fix it.
I voted for the Union dues one in CA. All the other ones were either stupid or completely confusing.
