Well, it's not all good news :-(

[fredv3b]

It dose not look good according to the blog, if you chose to be a negative thinker, I on the other hand am more positive. Now that a more liberal party is in control it will take time to undo the sins of the past. By the looks of the ages of the Supreme court . Obama will be appointing some new ones thus sawing the court to be a little more liberal. Which will help I am sure.

I am always amazed by the genuine faith of Americans in the ability of the law and lawyers to resolve their problems. However I agree that Democrat control of Congress will enable some progress on certain issues, but I doubt it will be overwhelming, there's lots else to do and its only 2 years away from the mid-term elections.

However this post is mainly to share something I've just come across on YouTube. I STRONGLY advise to watch it, not the usual we Brits expect from American TV.

[marshlander]

It dose not look good according to the blog, if you chose to be a negative thinker, I on the other hand am more positive. Now that a more liberal party is in control it will take time to undo the sins of the past. By the looks of the ages of the Supreme court . Obama will be appointing some new ones thus sawing the court to be a little more liberal. Which will help I am sure.

That sounds like good news, yar. Let's hope you're right.

[fjp999]

However this post is mainly to share something I've just come across on YouTube. I STRONGLY advise to watch it, not the usual we Brits expect from American TV.

Oberman is a pretty good commentator. He gets criticized a lot but it is good that he has a forum. MSNBC is pretty low in the cable news network ratings... but at least someone is watching.

With all the cable channels available and all the time to fill there are some very positive liberal views expressed, even on Fox News.

[Phil]

I wanna contribute to this thread but dont want me ignorance of the world of politics to show :redface: what are you guys stance's on the mormon aspect of the vote to put pro 8 through? and to a lesser degree the other minorities ala black and hispanic folk who voted yes?

[yar]

[quote=fredv3b]I am always amazed by the genuine faith of Americans in the ability of the law and lawyers to resolve their problems. However I agree that Democrat control of Congress will enable some progress on certain issues, but I doubt it will be overwhelming, there's lots else to do and its only 2 years away from the mid-term elections.

However this post is mainly to share something I've just come across on YouTube. I STRONGLY advise to watch it, not the usual we Brits expect from American TV.

Thanks for the vid. fred missed it while moving. If the liberals are doing well in 2 years they will be able to hold the power. I have faith that they will do better than fine. Really it cant get to much worse.

[marshlander]

I wanna contribute to this thread but dont want me ignorance of the world of politics to show :redface: what are you guys stance's on the mormon aspect of the vote to put pro 8 through? and to a lesser degree the other minorities ala black and hispanic folk who voted yes?

I am not at all surprised to hear the LDS church has been interfering in the process. They have always given financial support to campaigns they feel would allow them to carry on as normal and not force them to confront difficult church doctrine i.e. to anti-abortion or anti-the ordination of women campaigns. They only bowed to pressure to obey the law regarding their "plural marriages" in the late nineteenth century (although in practice it was well into the twentieth before some of the leaders renounced polygamy) or to allow African-American men to "hold the priesthood" in the 1970s when the political pressure became too strong and the advantages to them would be outweighed by the disadvantages if they failed to follow the appropriate laws. Their understanding of equality is that groups in society are different and have different roles to play (ie women can be "mothers in Zion", while men can "hold the priesthood" - who do you think holds the power there?). Hmm, seperate development ... where have I heard that idea before (...Dan?). At the moment we don't have enough support generally to be able to apply the right kind of pressure. If ever the tide turned and there was a risk to their financial or political powerbase you can be sure that God would conveniently give the president of the LDS church a revelation something along the lines that it was "time for all worthy men and women who love each other to have the right to marry".

I know less about the Hispanic and Black vote situation, but as I understand it several things seem to have coincided here. Many people of Hispanic and African American origin may have voted for the first time in these elections. The Catholic and other fundamentalist Christian religions are strong in the traditions (if not always the practices) of both groups. I suspect that many people would have voted with their prevailing prejudices or under instruction from priest and pastor, without even being aware that there are serious issues at stake for freedom and equality. Whilst in my heart I want to be able to be democratic, I have a strong sense that ignorance often causes democracy to falter. Had we had a referendum on the marriage/civil partnership issue in the UK I am not convinced we would be where we are today. This would be my word of caution to those in this discussion who have been rather xenophobic in their condemnation of the Californian vote. Here in Britain we have civil partnerships because the labour government pushed the law through. They pushed it through partly because of the pressure from Europe (not to underestimate the great work of pressure groups like Stonewall, for instance) to do so. Of course it could have been overturned had sufficient opposition been mustered and I believe that, given slightly different circumstances, the vote in the UK could have gone the other way.

I think, Phil, in answer to your question on this point, that Proposition 8 was probably argued in very simplistic terms and went through largely because malevolent vested interests (including the Mormon leadership) played on people's ignorance, fear and inexperience in the democratic process. If democracy is going to work, everyone who undertakes to vote has a responsibility to become fully aware of the issues, in my opinion. This did not happen in this case. Whether the "No" vote lobby campaigned effectively enough is another issue.

[marshlander]

... this post is mainly to share something I've just come across on YouTube. I STRONGLY advise to watch it, not the usual we Brits expect from American TV...

Thank you so much for this, Fred. I was in tears watching it. What an impressive essay.

[fredv3b]

I wanna contribute to this thread but dont want me ignorance of the world of politics to show :redface: what are you guys stance's on the mormon aspect of the vote to put pro 8 through? and to a lesser degree the other minorities ala black and hispanic folk who voted yes?

Dealing with the LDS issue first. I don't have an issue with them being in favour of Prop 8, I don't have an issue with LDS Church leaders IN CALIFORNIA telling their flocks that they should vote for Prop. 8, I don't have an issue with LDS Church leaders OUTSIDE OF CALIFORNIA telling their flocks about the wickedness in California and how it must be avoided in their state. What I do object to is LDS Church Leaders telling LDS the faithfull OUTSIDE OF CALIFORNIA that they should contribute as much as they can to the campaign. An estimated 70% of the funds raised by the proponents of Prop. 8 were from LDS Members (I don't know the in state / out of state split). By the same token if I was a Californian I would be most upset that non-Californians can send large amounts of money in to try and inflence a vote in my state.

As for the ethnic minorites I don't have an issue with them per se. However I do have an issue with folk who were for Prop. 8 but not so much so that it would cause them to get off their arses and go to the polling station, however they wanted to vote for Obama and whilst they happened to be at the polling station they voted for Prop 8. If you are going to ammend a Constitution and take people's rights away you ought to have a good reason to do it, which would be more than reason enough to get up and vote anyway regardless of the Presidential election. Such people are screwing around with peoples lives on an issue they don't feel that strongly about anyway. If you believe the analysis of the exit polls then a substantial number of black people fell into this category.

[Phil]

I think, Phil, in answer to your question on this point, that Proposition 8 was probably argued in very simplistic terms and went through largely because malevolent vested interests (including the Mormon leadership) played on people's ignorance, fear and inexperience in the democratic process. If democracy is going to work, everyone who undertakes to vote has a responsibility to become fully aware of the issues, in my opinion. This did not happen in this case. Whether the "No" vote lobby campaigned effectively enough is another issue.

[fjp999]

I wanna contribute to this thread but dont want me ignorance of the world of politics to show :redface: what are you guys stance's on the mormon aspect of the vote to put pro 8 through? and to a lesser degree the other minorities ala black and hispanic folk who voted yes?

I think, Phil, in answer to your question on this point, that Proposition 8 was probably argued in very simplistic terms and went through largely because malevolent vested interests (including the Mormon leadership) played on people's ignorance, fear and inexperience in the democratic process. If democracy is going to work, everyone who undertakes to vote has a responsibility to become fully aware of the issues, in my opinion. This did not happen in this case. Whether the "No" vote lobby campaigned effectively enough is another issue.

Just read somewhere that protest are going on against the LDS churches because of the HUGE amounts of money put into a YES vote by the LDS churches...

I dont have the numbers in front of me but do understand that not only was this the most money ever spent in a presidential race but Prop 8 had the most money spent in the history of propositions in any state!

I think marsh is correct and the message is a simple one: allowing two men or two women to marry will destroy the heteros marriages. The statistics are against this concept but for some reason it has stuck in the minds of liberal heteros especially the minorities.

UGH... again, like allowing bi-racial marriages to be recognized it will take a constitutional amendment... like what seems to have happened in England... where the politicians just say YES to humans marrying.

it all just exhausts me, LOL