Prop 8 Upheld - LGBT Californians Are Officially 2nd Class Citizens

The Nuts and Bolts:  California's ban on same-sex marriage resulted from an anti-gay smear campaign disproportionately financed by Utah's LDS Church.  Religious conservatives appealed to voters' fears with odious TV commercials and deceptive print advertising.  Their strategy worked.

The Screw:  This afternoon, six of California's Supreme Court judges upheld the state's mean-spirited Proposition 8.  Even though the ruling wasn't unexpected, it's still hurtful.  Bigots have won this particular battle.  But for them it will be a short lived victory, as fair-minded Californians reflect on the issue in years to come.

The Bright Red Outrage:  Can you just image the cries of "injustice" and "tyranny" we'd be hearing if the court had overturned the referendum?  As it is, fundies are already fuming that the thousands of marriages performed before Prop 8 was passed have been deemed valid by the court.  The homo haters at Save California showed their true colors in a press release:  Today's decision means every homosexual couple that wanted a "same-sex marriage" last year, got one. The decision also means some 18,000 counterfeit marriages will be held out as role models to impressionable children. By allowing these numerous false marriages to stand, the Supreme Court is holding out to impressionable boys and girls the unnatural role model of homosexual 'marriages.'  (Will they ever be satisfied?) 

The Lonely Blue Hope:  In the court's sole dissenting opinion, Justice Carlos Moreno declared that the decision "weakens the status of our state Constitution as a bulwark of fundamental rights for minorities protected from the will of the majority...  Promising equal treatment to some is fundamentally different from promising equal treatment to all.  Promising treatment that is almost equal is fundamentally different from ensuring truly equal treatment. Granting a disfavored minority only some of the rights enjoyed by the majority is fundamentally different from recognizing, as a constitutional imperative, that they must be granted all of those rights."  (Thanks for understanding, Justice Moreno.)

On Huffington Post, Lisa Leff writes about one couple who were anxiously awaiting the ruling -  Karen Strauss and Ruth Borenstein, lead plaintiffs in the lawsuit challenging Proposition 8:  The two women, partners for 17 years, had wanted to marry in the presence of their parents, who live in Florida.  But Strauss' 84-year-old mother is dying of cancer, and they now realize she won't live long enough to attend their dream wedding no matter what.  "People who don't know us, who have nothing to lose by our decisions, had the opportunity to decide for us this most private and personal decision," said Strauss, 51, who will be across the country at her mother's bedside when the decision comes down. "That is a personally painful position to be in, whichever way it goes."

Perhaps now the heterosexual couples who voted for Prop 8 will be able to rest easy.  The court has ruled in their favor.  They've protected the "sanctity of marriage" by crushing the dreams of many of their fellow citizens.

UPDATE - From Mercury News:  Two of the nation's top litigators who opposed each other in the Bush v. Gore election challenge in 2000 have joined forces to seek federal court intervention in California's gay marriage controversy.  Theodore B. Olson and David Boies have filed a U.S. District Court lawsuit on behalf of two gay men and two gay women, arguing that the California constitutional amendment eliminating the right of gay couples to marry violates the U.S. constitutional guarantee of equal protection and due process.   This is interesting because Ted Olsen usually aligns himself with right-wing causes.  (John Avarosis calls him The Devil.)  Still, if this ends up in the U.S. Supreme Court before Obama makes a second appointment (after Sotomayor), we'll lose.  SCOTUS, as it now stands, is weighed down by too many socially conservative ideologues - thanks to George W. Bush.