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News & ArtsSunday, August 8, 2010
Homo / News "A witness stand is a lonely place to lie."
Posted by Dan Savage on Sun, Aug 8, 2010 at 12:43 PM
Which is why Tony Perkins' prefers to lie on news programs. But David Boies won't let him get away with it. Watch as Boies calls Tony Perkins a liar to his lying face—it's required viewing.
Pimping junk science and flat-out lying about "empirical data" that doesn't exist—it's also known as "bearing false witness," which is one of the Ten Commandments' top ten thou-shalt-nots. So after you enjoy this clip—after you watch one straight man hand another straight (cough, cough) man his ass in an argument about gay marriage—say a little prayer for Tony Perkins' eternal soul.
And Ted Olson lays into Fox News' tool Chris Wallace after the jump...
3
When lies are exposed, could it really be that sanity will prevail? God, I hope so!
Thanks, I've forwarded these on.
Thanks, I've forwarded these on.
4
I want to explore Ted Olson's idea a bit: what if we proposed an amendment to the Washington State Constitution that outlawed Fox News from broadcasting? We could use the exact same arguments that are used against gay marriage:
1. It's damaging to previously existing news networks.
2. The children suffer (my neighbor watches Fox quite excessively, and his kids are totally screwed up - correlation doesn't mean causation, but when we're talking about the welfare of the children, we can't be too cautious!)
3. If the voters want it, then by Jeebus, they should have it, Second Amendment be damned!
4. We have a long national history of not having Fox News - in fact, this country was built on not having Fox News. The introduction of Fox News is DIFFERENT from what we've had before, therefore, it must be bad, and must be abolished!
I'm sure there are more points we can make here - anyone else?
1. It's damaging to previously existing news networks.
2. The children suffer (my neighbor watches Fox quite excessively, and his kids are totally screwed up - correlation doesn't mean causation, but when we're talking about the welfare of the children, we can't be too cautious!)
3. If the voters want it, then by Jeebus, they should have it, Second Amendment be damned!
4. We have a long national history of not having Fox News - in fact, this country was built on not having Fox News. The introduction of Fox News is DIFFERENT from what we've had before, therefore, it must be bad, and must be abolished!
I'm sure there are more points we can make here - anyone else?
5
I question why they get a preacher in as part of the discussion. Why not an attorney from the other side? Where have THEY been throughout the days since the decision came down? Yes, it's been great to see our friends being interviewed on all the shows, but where are the attorneys from the other side? Hiding under their rocks, and waiting for the checks from Perkins and his ilk to clear, most likely.
7
David Boies is so well-spoken. I think I have a crush. <3
Can't believe fag-hag used the "anyone with half a brain" argument. That's an internet argument for someone who doesn't know what the hell they're talking about.
Can't believe fag-hag used the "anyone with half a brain" argument. That's an internet argument for someone who doesn't know what the hell they're talking about.
8
@4 pt. 3, I think you mean the equal-protection part of the Fourteenth Amendment (unless you're truly imagining a Jeebus-vs.-guns smackdown), but otherwise I like what you did there.
9
This is going to be preaching to the choir, but it just really bugs me when Perkins and others say there is either no evidence about lesbians and gay men as parents, or that the evidence says they are likely to cause harm. Tons of studies from the past couple decades refute both claims: http://apa.org/pi/lgbt/resources/policy/…. There have been press releases, blogs, and newspaper articles whenever something like the recent study in Pediatrics about lesbian mothers comes out.
Addressing all that research is just too much work! It's easier to rely on "we aren't bigots, we just want to think of the children." I get that: it's hard work preventing "one of the basic structures in society" from forming. You have to keep on it from birth to death: making it as hard as possible for gay families to have kids, kicking their children out of Catholic school, canceling prom and then making up a fake one, and hassling older couples when they go to the hospital. No wonder there has been no time to read about the empirical data.
Addressing all that research is just too much work! It's easier to rely on "we aren't bigots, we just want to think of the children." I get that: it's hard work preventing "one of the basic structures in society" from forming. You have to keep on it from birth to death: making it as hard as possible for gay families to have kids, kicking their children out of Catholic school, canceling prom and then making up a fake one, and hassling older couples when they go to the hospital. No wonder there has been no time to read about the empirical data.
10
@7 I think it was just his way of pointing out that he only has half of a brain. (Cuz he didn't say "at least" half a brain haha.)
11
@9 - We're all about preaching to the choir here! Like-minded commenter community that we are (house troll Loveschild excepted - where'd he/she go anyway?). But speaking of that - anyone know where you can go online to get into good arguments with fundies or other people on the wrong side of this issue? That may not be everyone's idea of fun (it's not always mine either), but sometimes i get in a mood to shoot a barrel of drugged trout*. Let me know, O faithful sloggers.
*stolen from the late lamented David Foster Wallace
*stolen from the late lamented David Foster Wallace
12
Very enjoyable, highlighting inadvertently how rarely any news program cares to invite anyone serious to speak more than a few words at a time any more. I'm pleased this occasion arose.
13
Ted Olson did a fantastic job. And I must reluctantly grant that Chris Wallace was gracious after his ass was kicked verbally.
14
Although Mike Wallace has never expressed any disappointment with his son's professional career, I imagine that Chis's allegiance to the FOX empire sorely disappoints him. Chris Wallace has descended from a respected journalist eight years ago to a closed minded automaton incapable of insight or inquisitiveness. His inability to grasp Olson's basic premise that no new right was being established by this ruling; rather that the ruling reaffirms the longstanding SCOTUS stance that marriage is a fundamental right of all individuals was completely lost on Wallace.
15
Chris Wallace bothers me a lot more than Tony Perkins.
Tony Perkins is and always will be a well-dressed shill for the extreme right wing. He is exactly what we expect him to be, and completely predictable.
But after watching Mike Wallace for most of my life, I cringe whenever I see Chris Wallace pretend to be a journalist. It's sad and pathetic, and I can't help but think his dad must be totally embarrassed. Watching Ted Olson destroy him was immensely satisfying.
Tony Perkins is and always will be a well-dressed shill for the extreme right wing. He is exactly what we expect him to be, and completely predictable.
But after watching Mike Wallace for most of my life, I cringe whenever I see Chris Wallace pretend to be a journalist. It's sad and pathetic, and I can't help but think his dad must be totally embarrassed. Watching Ted Olson destroy him was immensely satisfying.
16
As this issue slips through the Christian Right's hands, they're going to start arguing exactly what Perkins said -- but much more on-message --> Gay marriage is too new a concept, and too few children have so far been raised by gay couples to be able to say that there will be no long-term damage to society and to the children. I just know they're going to go there.
17
@11 Any of Andrew Breitbart's sites. RedState.com. Michelle Malkin. All the blogs on National Review Online. All of Foxnews.com. (I'm too lazy to type in code for hyperlinks. Sorry!)
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@11: http://opine-editorials.blogspot.com/
One of these guys is convinced that he's got a winning argument with his claim that gays practice gender-discrimination against women, and same-sex marriage would codify that gender discrimination. Or something like that.
And by the way, there's no "ban" on gay marriage.
Also from opineeditorials: There was a ban on issuing marriage licenses to brideless or groomless pairings. But there was no ban on ceremonies or any of the other things that brides and grooms have been doing together for millennia that have been mimmicked or downright mocked by brideless or groomless couples. Or triads, or quads - of any sexual composition for that matter.
One of these guys is convinced that he's got a winning argument with his claim that gays practice gender-discrimination against women, and same-sex marriage would codify that gender discrimination. Or something like that.
And by the way, there's no "ban" on gay marriage.
Also from opineeditorials: There was a ban on issuing marriage licenses to brideless or groomless pairings. But there was no ban on ceremonies or any of the other things that brides and grooms have been doing together for millennia that have been mimmicked or downright mocked by brideless or groomless couples. Or triads, or quads - of any sexual composition for that matter.
19
Glenn Greenwald puts it best (via Twitter):
Ted Olson and David Boies are insanely good advocates for marriage equality -
20
@ 7 - Honey, I have a crush on David Boies. I would abandon poon for that man. Good lord.
*Runs off to fan herself*
*Runs off to fan herself*
23
Tony Perkins is a frigging muppet. The level of conscious control he exerts over his facial expressions is unnatural.
29
@16, aka Judith:
[Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer.]
In his dissent in Lawrence, Scalia argued that when the Court decided Roe v. Wade in 1973, they were taking what should be a state issue and making it a Federal issue, and a lot of people had strongly held religious-based views against abortion. As a result, since Roe v. Wade, there's been a lot of litigation because--Scalia argues--the Court was way out in front of public opinion (and he would say wrong) when they ruled.
So, in spite of the merits in law and in fact of Perry, Scalia would want SCOTUS to overturn because it would doubtless lead to legal mayhem.
Kennedy is the swing vote, and if Kennedy decides to end his career on the court quietly and not be forever known as "That Gay Marriage Judge Guy," this could provide him with an out.
BUT--this just in--because there was no government intervenor in California on behalf of Prop 8, the proponents may not have standing to appeal to the Supreme Court. So the whole point may be moot.
(And I apologize for being so long winded here where commenters delight in being brief and pithy.)
[Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer.]
In his dissent in Lawrence, Scalia argued that when the Court decided Roe v. Wade in 1973, they were taking what should be a state issue and making it a Federal issue, and a lot of people had strongly held religious-based views against abortion. As a result, since Roe v. Wade, there's been a lot of litigation because--Scalia argues--the Court was way out in front of public opinion (and he would say wrong) when they ruled.
So, in spite of the merits in law and in fact of Perry, Scalia would want SCOTUS to overturn because it would doubtless lead to legal mayhem.
Kennedy is the swing vote, and if Kennedy decides to end his career on the court quietly and not be forever known as "That Gay Marriage Judge Guy," this could provide him with an out.
BUT--this just in--because there was no government intervenor in California on behalf of Prop 8, the proponents may not have standing to appeal to the Supreme Court. So the whole point may be moot.
(And I apologize for being so long winded here where commenters delight in being brief and pithy.)
30
@20 over at prop8trialtracker.com there was a move afoot to have t-shirts printed with the phrase "Lesbians Love Boies" during the trial. There's also a commenter in the blog with that handle.
32
Watching Boies makes me less fearful of the Supreme Court case(s) to come. He so kicks ass in speaking truth to liars.
33
Boies & Olson are the main reasons this case will win, besides the obvious rightness of the cause. They know how to shape Supreme Court cases & arguments, which is the key to getting laws changed.
I particularly like Olson's statement about the 14th Ammendment being a result of a Civil War fought over the question of Equality. The matter is settled in a way that a simple poll of Californians can't change.
I particularly like Olson's statement about the 14th Ammendment being a result of a Civil War fought over the question of Equality. The matter is settled in a way that a simple poll of Californians can't change.
34
I'm always confused as to why defenders of same-sex marriage let the most outrageous straw man from the other side slip through: the argument that same-sex couples are inferior as parents to heterosexual couples, when they're almost never actually in competition for children. Even if you believe that a hypothetical child is better off with a mommy and a daddy instead of two of one or the other, surely a REAL child is better off with two daddies than living without parents?
36
"A judge who thinks he knows better than 7 million Californians!"
I should HOPE Judge Walker thinks he knows better than 7 million Californians! He sat through days and days of testimony brought forward by attorneys who painstakingly assembled their cases, while most of the voters who voted Yes on 8 did so on the basis of some things they heard from various unreliable sources like preachers, the Yes on 8 campaign, friends and family no better informed than themselves, and media talking heads. It is the right and the duty of judges to deliberate with a cool head on issues that Joe Public gets a hot head over. The Founding Fathers spent a lot of time thinking about two things they feared and how to avoid them: autocratic tyranny and mob rule. Through Article 3 of the Constitution, the Judiciary Act of 1793, and Marbury vs. Madison, they empowered judges to be the level-headed voice of reason to guard against both.
I should HOPE Judge Walker thinks he knows better than 7 million Californians! He sat through days and days of testimony brought forward by attorneys who painstakingly assembled their cases, while most of the voters who voted Yes on 8 did so on the basis of some things they heard from various unreliable sources like preachers, the Yes on 8 campaign, friends and family no better informed than themselves, and media talking heads. It is the right and the duty of judges to deliberate with a cool head on issues that Joe Public gets a hot head over. The Founding Fathers spent a lot of time thinking about two things they feared and how to avoid them: autocratic tyranny and mob rule. Through Article 3 of the Constitution, the Judiciary Act of 1793, and Marbury vs. Madison, they empowered judges to be the level-headed voice of reason to guard against both.
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