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City of LA Meddles More in Business

Posted by Playful Walrus on Wednesday, July 23, 2008 6:32:23 PM
The editors at the Los Angeles Times who hate plastic bags and people in the ‘hood having fast food easily accessible got their wish.  What the City of L.A. Council is doing about plastic bags is here.  Below, I discuss the paper’s coverage of the council’s one-year band on new fast-food restaurants in “South L.A.” (South Central).  Staff writer Molly Hennessy-Fiske reports.
If approved by the full council and signed by the mayor, the law would prevent fast-food chains from opening new restaurants in a 32-square-mile area, including West Adams, Baldwin Village and Leimert Park. The moratorium would be in effect for one year, with the possibility of two six-month extensions.
So, let’s say someone living in the ‘hood with money to invest wants to CHOOSE to turn an empty lot or an ugly vacant building into a fast food outlet, and people from the ‘hood would CHOOSE to work there instead of being unemployed, and people would CHOOSE to eat there and CHOOSE what they order from the many-option menu, and the business would generate tax revenue and discourage blight.  This committee on the council (as well as the editors of the Los Angeles Times) wouldn’t let people make those choices.
The measure, proposed by Councilwoman Jan Perry, whose 9th District includes much of South Los Angeles, defines a fast-food restaurant as "any establishment which dispenses food for consumption on or off the premises, and which has the following characteristics: a limited menu, items prepared in advance or prepared or heated quickly, no table orders and food served in disposable wrapping or containers."
What it if only has some of those characteristics?  What if someone built a burger joint the same as one two blocks over that is out of this arbitrary area, only they take your order a table and bring your burger to your table.  Would it be okay then?
Councilman Jack Weiss said restrictions on fast-food restaurants in Westwood have caused problems for such businesses as Ben & Jerry's and Smoothie King, which would not otherwise be considered fast-food outlets.
Yeah, well, there’s often collateral damage from such restrictions.  Wonder what Ben and Jerry have to say?
Perry said that after speaking with restaurant lobbyists, she amended her proposal to allow for "fast-food casual" restaurants, such as Subway or Pastagina, that do not have heat lamps or drive-through windows and that prepare fresh food to order.

Perry said she has been attempting to address the health issues associated with fast food, such as diabetes and obesity.
I can add plenty of fat ordering at a Subway.  I also highly doubt this will cause anyone to lose weight.  Most of my fat came from food purchased in a supermarket.
She is trying to persuade supermarket chains and sit-down restaurants to open in her district, which has been especially hard hit with such health problems.
Those businesses are not going to go where it isn’t worth the trouble.  Arbitrary city regulations and “community leader” demands and high crime and riots where buildings get looted and burned scare away businesses.  Banning fast food will not mean that other businesses will suddenly show up.  If anything, it will discourage them because they don’t want to invest in an area where arbitrary restrictions are applied on the whims of the city council.
The Community Redevelopment Agency is offering grocers and restaurants incentives that include tax credits, electricity discounts and expedited reviews by the city Planning Department and Building and Safety Department.
The more you get government involved, the more you have to get government involved.  Just get out and let the market work.
"It's important to offer incentives to bring restaurants into an area, especially an area that has suffered prejudices and stereotypes," Perry said.
Prejudice nothing.  If riots and gangs show up in Beverly Hills, businesses will avoid that area, too.  Businesses want money.  In order to make money, they need an adequate supply of labor and customers - which are hard to attract if there is a lot of crime.
Julia Ansley, 66, a retired elementary school teacher who has lived in South L.A. more than 40 years, attended the meeting and said afterward that she was encouraged by the vote. "It's much needed," she said of the proposed ordinance.
Don’t like fast food?  Don’t eat it!
In April, the county Department of Public Health released a study showing that 30% of South Los Angeles adults were obese, compared with about 21% of adults countywide. South L.A. also has the highest incidence of diabetes in the county, 11.7% compared with 8.1% for the county as a whole.

A Times analysis of the city's roughly 8,200 restaurants late last year found that South L.A. had the highest concentration of fast-food eateries.
Perhaps the causation you are implying is reversed?  Perhaps these businesses have followed the demand?  Regardless, these things are the result of people making choices for themselves, and government should not be playing nanny.  The real reason a government gets involved in these sorts of things is because we have allowed the government to get too involved in our health care.  With health care costs being part of the government budget, administrators will want to lower costs.  The more the government gets involved in health care, the more restrictions on our choices we’re going to see.  Some people who insist that government should have no say in what we do with our genitals or body orifices below the belt think it is okay for the government to control what goes into – or comes out of - our mouths.

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More Class Envy: Tim Rutten in the Los Angeles Times

Posted by Playful Walrus on Wednesday, July 23, 2008 3:56:08 PM
Why do people continue to ignore basic economic truth?  Tim Rutten has a class envy opinion piece in today’s Los Angeles Times.
With unemployment climbing across the country, the New York Times reported that "for the first time since the women's movement came to life, an economic recovery has come and gone, and the percentage of women at work has fallen, not risen, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports.
So what?
Each of the seven previous recoveries since 1960 ended with a greater percentage of women at work than when it began."
That’s because women were exercising their access to the mainstream workforce, and that sort of thing tends to ramp up at first.  What’s wrong with more women choosing to raise their own children? (Although one commenter claims that there hasn’t been a drop of women working outside the home – it has to do with how the statistics are compiled in relation to married, divorce, shacking up, etc.)
Working women now earn a third of America's total household income, and by and large, only those homes with a working wife have made real gains in their standard of living over the last eight years.
That’s code for “It’s Bush’s fault you’re not richer.”

He then moves on to lamenting that Candy Spelling (widow of television powerhouse Aaron Spelling) is paying $47 million for a condo.  I'll bet the employees working for the developer and the investors don't mind.
As Vincent wrote: "At a time when headlines are focusing on plummeting home prices, foreclosures and bad loans, the sale highlighted the vast differences in the region's housing market."
You bet it did, particularly when you consider a set of numbers that came out later in the day. DataQuick, which keeps reliable track of the California real estate market, reported that a record number of L.A. County households -- 21,632 -- defaulted on their mortgages in the second quarter of this year.
People shouldn’t buy houses that they can’t afford, counting on the value to keep increasing in the near term, using risky loans.  Guess what?  Mrs. Spelling can afford her home, so there’s no problem.  Me, I didn't buy a home I couldn't afford.  And now I'm going to buy a house I couldn't afford a year ago because the price has come down.  And I'll probably be able to hold on to and rent out my current home.  How did I escape financial ruin?  Last I checked, Bush is my President and I live in the same world as Candy Spelling, too.
Taken together, though, the plight of working women and Spelling's let-them-eat-cake, $47-million extravagance point to the fact that, all but unnoticed, America has slipped into a new Gilded Age, with all the inequalities that historical appellation implies.
Thank God there are inequalities of outcome.  The bigger the spectrum the better – as long as the “poor” in the country are still rich compared to most of the world – because that means people at the top are getting even better at generating wealth.
From the late 1940s through 1978, the U.S. economy excelled at distributing opportunities. According to Census Bureau figures, median family income increased by more than 100% during that period. But it has grown by less than 25% in the 30 years since.
It is a mistake to think that things should always grow at the same rate.  This kind of complaint is as bad as corporate investors who think a long-established businesses should keep growing consistently at something like 20% in a short interval.  It just isn’t going to happen.
The census' inflation-adjusted numbers show that a median American family made $61,000 in 2000 and, despite the economic expansion through most of the Bush administration, just $60,500 in 2007.
Perhaps people are learning to spend less and don’t need to earn as much?  This is clearly meant to portray Bush as bad and Clinton as good.  But what is more important number is how much of their own money people got to keep to spend, save, and invest as they chose.  What were the tax rates on that income in those years, hmmmmmm?
Recent data suggest that the richest 1% of U.S. households -- those with annual incomes of $348,000 or better -- now control 34.3% of the nation's net worth, while the bottom 40% of households dispose of just 0.2% of America's wealth.

What do you suppose the chances are of getting either John McCain or Barack Obama to hit this issue head on?
New government programs and regulations would do more harm than good.  It isn’t the job of the President (or Congress, for that matter) to redistribute wealth.  This country already has tremendous rates of upward mobility – just check out the list of richest Americans and notice how many of them came from modest origins, or are the child of someone who did.

The best thing either candidate could do to ensure that the most people have the most opportunity for upward mobility is to discourage dependency on the government and lower taxes and regulations.  The more Washington, D.C. restricts or controls or punishes or subsidizes investment, selling goods and services, and employment, the fewer the number of people who will be able to do these things.  When you centralize and increase power in the federal government, you make it easier for the rich to skew things to their own advantage and thwart any new competition.  Rich people find it easier to adapt to new restrictions and taxes, because they can move their resources around, pay advisers, etc.

There is nothing wrong with someone enjoying their wealth, even if was earned by their late spouse.  Wealthy people are good at creating wealth.  That’s a good thing.  They can only spend so much on consumables/perishables.  That means they can give more to charity, they have more money to invest (which helps the middle class) and to hire employees (which helps the middle and low-income earners).

In our country, someone who sticks to some simple rules will be unlikely to be poor.  Some of those rules are things like finishing high school, going on to further schooling, avoiding substance abuse, not having children out of wedlock, marrying instead of shacking up, attending religious services, etc.  Now, I know we conservatives are told to “mind your own business” and not to “force our morality” on others and to “focus on your own family”.  And that’s fine, as long as you don’t force your hands into our wallets.  Moral behavior aids fiscal conservatism and smaller government, which is why the Republican coalition makes sense.

There are plenty of comments on the website.  I wouldn’t be surprised if there are a few good letters to the editor in the coming days, too.
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Neutering Marriage Devalues and Discourages Marriage

Posted by Playful Walrus on Wednesday, July 23, 2008 10:26:36 AM
...and that is bad for children and therefore bad for society.

Some marriages are arranged.  Most in our country aren't.  Some are about love, some are about lust, some are about money.  Some are about class.  Marriage is about many things, but from a societal interest, it is – and always has been - about forming a microcosm of society for the purpose of perpetuating it.  It is about joining the two sexes and providing any offspring with both a mother and a father – and that has been the universal core of marriage throughout all of human history.

In other words, licensed marriage on its most basic and level is about children.

But when laws are passed (or, in our case, a court decision is issued) neutering marriage licensing, so that two men or two women can legally be designated as “married”, this is a statement that marriage, as an institution, can't be about children – because it takes both a woman and a man to make a child.  Some marriages may be about children, but marriage in and of itself can't be about children - if there is a right for any two people to have a licensed marriage.  Rulings like the recent California Supreme Court decision make the statement that licensed marriage is about feelings, or benefits, or hospital access, or any number of things that have been cited by marriage neutering activists - all of which can be addressed without a marriage license.

If marriage can't be about children, a disconnect is created in the public consciousness between marriage and raising children.  Even libertarian atheist Tom Leykis, who insists that there is no benefit for a man to get married - that men can get everything they want without marriage - states that marriage benefits children.  Yet now we have an official state policy that makes it clear that marriage is not about children.

Although we are already experiencing a significant level of illegitimacy (thanks to a disconnect between sex and marriage), divorce (thanks to a disconnect between commitment and marriage), blended families rife with jealousy, insecurity, and confusion, and a disconnect between coitus and reproduction (thanks to IVF), we still have a society that expresses that it is ideal to raise children within a marriage that created or adopted them and associates marriage with children.  Except in gay circles, when someone says "We got married," one of the first questions people ask is "When do you plan on having children?"  Paternity is assigned to husbands by default when their wife births a child, even if she could have conceived the child by another man.  Ex-husbands often pay child support for children that where there before he ever met their mother.  Child support is expected from an ex-spouse even if the other ex-spouse is financially capable of providing for the child without assistance.  Even many people who cohabitate and procreate out of wedlock get married, in large part, “for the sake of their children.”

Why?  Because children do best with a both a mother and a father, even more so if they are married to each other, and it takes both a male and a female to create children.  Whether by design or as a consequence of evolution, children do best in having both that male and female parental authority as a model and with whom to bond.  That child will, throughout her life, interact with both males and females.  Even if you believe that our existence and the way we reproduce are sheer meaningless accidents, that socialization is important to perpetuating society in the best conditions.

Most, if not all, of the people who deny this appear to be motivated not by what is best for children or society, but what is best for homosexuals, fornicators, and divorced people politically and socially.  Someone who wants a child but doesn't have a spouse (of the opposite sex) will try to justify their actions, and those who think a marriage license will bring their relationship and themselves whatever (approval, benefits, etc.) they are seeking will likewise deny the importance of having both a mother and father (1).

If marriage is about children, then it ought to be restricted to the kind of unions that can produce children (2).  If it isn't about children, then it should be about whatever else benefits society.  Homosexuality advocates say that purpose is creating stability in "sexual" relationships.  But that is in conflict with their own insistence that sexual behavior between two consenting adults is a private matter in which the state should not be involved.

If we are going to continue down this path of neutered marriage licensing, we should expect higher illegitimacy rates and perhaps increased divorce rates and/or lower marital rates (3), because there will be less of an association between child-rearing and marriage.  If marriage is not about children, then a husband should feel no guilt in leaving the mother of his child if he feels she has neglected her vows.  If our statistical analyses do not make the distinction between bride-groom marriages and other unions, then we can also expect a statistical increase in "marital" domestic violence, substance abuse, infidelity, and physical and mental health issues, as these are acknowledged issues of increased frequency in the gay community.  That would be something else that would make licensed marriage less attractive, along with the presence of or desire for children being less of an incentive.

If we are going to continue down this path where marriage isn't about children, then we should at least be consistent and not assign default paternity to husbands, or require child support if the custodial parent earns enough to provide for a child, or require stepparents (almost always fathers) to provide child support in the event of a divorce.  This can probably have applications to inheritance laws, too.

I agree that the government should not be policing the bedroom, even if I think that homosexual behavior is morally wrong and unhealthy.  I can understand why we have no-fault divorce laws.  But the government does have an interest in licensing bride-groom marriage that it doesn't have with same-sex couples.  Citizens are better off if they have been raised within a lasting marriage with both a father and a mother, and less likely to commit crime or be dependent on welfare.  We must not yield this beneficial construct to be sacrificed on the altar of homosexual esteem.  We must not allow marriage to be devalued by denying the core universal thread that has made marriage what it is.

Marriage may be about love, but it is primarily about children, and giving them a mother and a father.

(1) Neutered marriage licensing under the guise that same-sex couples have a “right” to marry will make it impossible for adoption agencies, social workers, fertility clinics, laws, and courts to give any preference to bride-groom couples over same-sex couples in placing children (or academia or others from presenting bride-groom couples as the norm or ideal).  The advocates of this “equality” cite flawed studies to support their claim that there is no difference to children if they are raised by two men, two women, or a man and a woman, as long as it is two "parents".  There are two ways to demonstrate that this must be false: A) If “two parents”, regardless of sex, are better than one, then point out that surely three parents would be preferable to two, and four preferable to three, and so forth, and ask if preference should be given to the largest group parenting arrangement over “couple parenting”, and; B) The homosexual knows there is a difference between men and women - and therefore mothers and fathers - when it comes to personal relationships. Otherwise, the homosexual could just as easily be attracted to someone of the opposite sex.

(2) Yes, not all bride-groom couples choose to or can create children, but they are the only kind that can without the aid of a third party, while no same-sex couples have ever been able to create children alone.  Regardless, bride-groom couples still form a microcosm of society by uniting the sexes, and we do not check fertility status of marriage license applicants as that would be a violation of privacy.  Indeed, sexual orientation is not a criterion either.

(3) The correlation has been noted in other countries that have recently implemented neutered marriage.  Although correlation does not prove causation, it is clear that the culture of these societies don't esteem marriage or raising children within marriage as much as ours - should we be striving to be more like them when it comes to marriage licensing?

Marriage is Dead (Part 1)

Marriage is Dead (Part 2)

It Takes a Bride and Groom to Make a Marriage

More on the Definition of Marriage

Why Marriage Matters

Bad Arguments for Neutering Marriage Licensing

Proposition 8 Won't Hurt Anyone

What Homosexuality Advocates Will Do After Neutering Marriage

Three Observations on the California Marriage Issue

Legislating For Feelings is a Bad Idea
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Follow up on UMC Marriage Fight

Posted by Playful Walrus on Tuesday, July 22, 2008 6:42:41 PM
The Los Angeles Times printed a couple of letters today in response to the article, which I covered here, on how homosexuality advocates were causing conflict within the United Methodist Church.

Paul G. Teague of Lakewood supports neutering marriage, yet writes:
Purposely violating or encouraging the violation of church law while still claiming the title of "pastor" in the United Methodist Church is far more hypocritical than a perceived conflict between church law and a slogan.

The truth is, the California-Pacific conference, and many of the ministers within the conference, only care about their specific agenda and not the greater church.
So Mr. Teague gets it, even if he doesn’t agree that marriage is a bride-groom thing.
It is for this reason that after 10 years as a United Methodist member, I have decided to leave the church.
So he didn’t leave because of the official affirmation that marriage is a bride-groom union, but because of the way some of the homosexuality advocates are pushing their agenda within the church.  Interesting.

John A. Zimmer or Ventura, a retired UMC pastor, writes:
It is distressing that a denomination that advertises that it is a church of "Open Hearts. Open Minds. Open Doors." is closed to gays and lesbians.
This is not true.  The UMC is open to gays and lesbians, but not performing a mockery of the original ceremony God gave mankind.
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Los Angeles Times is Anti-Choice

Posted by Playful Walrus on Tuesday, July 22, 2008 3:05:28 PM
The editors at the Los Angeles Times are anti-choice.  Oh, they still support a woman’s “right” to have someone else slaughter her baby.  They are against choices when it comes to food and bags.

They argue that it makes sense to arbitrarily ban new “fast food outlets” in an arbitrarily defined part of the City of L.A. called “South L.A.” (which means South Central, or the hood) when:
When the area suffers from a historic lack of the kind of planning ordinances and design guidelines that govern traffic flow, development and general livability in places such as Westwood and Pacific Palisades.
C’mon.  This is not a traffic issue.
When the failure of the planning process leads to such a concentration of drive-throughs -- with their garish signage, cookie-cutter design, street-fronting parking lots and idling cars -- that it dissuades supermarkets and other businesses from locating nearby.
Business go where they can make money.  The fast food business are there because people there choose to use them.  The main reason a business, such a supermarket, would not locate there is because the regulations and crime (including riots) make it too difficult to operate at a profit.
When developers and investors mentally write off the area for anything other than fast-food franchises, figuring that residents must want them or there wouldn't be so many.
They do want them.  What franchisee is going to open up where there are no customers?
When the city's economic geography, politics and practice create a self-perpetuating business wasteland and catch-as-catch-can projects that never match the aspirations of its neglected populace.
The editors think the people of this area are too stupid or too lazy to go after what they want.

They also think we should all be punished because some people litter, arguing for a ban on plastic shopping bags.

I like plastic shopping bags.  They can be recycled, they are convenient, they are made out of a natural substance (petroleum), they have many convenient uses, and they help prevent the kind of food contamination possible when reusing non-plastic bags to carry food.

Why not punish the people who litter?
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Whiner Nation On Display in Dear Abby Letter

Posted by Playful Walrus on Tuesday, July 22, 2008 1:06:18 PM
In another “Phil Gramm is right” example, we have this:

TOM IN LONG BEACH, CALIF writes in to Dear Abby:
I am in my early 40s. Most of my good friends, whom I have known my whole life, have not given a second thought to our approaching "golden years."
And you are “good friends” with such irresponsible people?
No one is saving money for retirement, participating in any sort of plan or even thinking about how they will manage later in life.
This displays a breakdown in maturity and reasoning skills.  There are some basic realities that these people are not addressing, such as: we will all continue to get older until we die; it generally becomes more difficult to work as we grow older; medical expenses tend to increase as we grow older.
They all have fun, interesting, low-paying jobs.
In many cases, they simply don’t want to deal with anything more difficult than that.  It almost always takes hard work and planning and hard decisions and risking failure to make more money.
I worry that when my friends are senior citizens they will be destitute. They laugh off my worries.
They “laugh off” because it is their mechanism that allows them to avoid dwelling on thoughts of the inevitable.  Either they purposely do not think about it, or are in denial in that they think they will always be able to work and will enjoy doing so, or they think that one of the following will happen:

1) They will win the lottery.
        Not likely at al!
2) They will hit it big as an artist or inventor or writer or something like that with minimal effort.
        Possible, but it takes a lot of hard work and if they are in their 40s, chances are that ship has passed.
3) A relative will die and leave them enough to give them a comfortable life for the rest of their days.
        Not likely, especially when you consider taxes, inflation, and the money getting split.
4) They will find a rich man who will marry them and take care of them for the rest of their lives.
        For a woman in her 40s, that is extremely unlikely.  Such sugar daddies also attract 30 and 20-somethings, who are generally preferable to men enjoying their wealth.  Plus such men can easily insulate their wealth and leave it to others upon their deaths.
5) Wishful thinking, like in The Secret, will bring them wealth.
        God is not a cosmic bellhop.
6) Santa Claus, in the form of “the government”, will provide for all of their needs.
My parents are enjoying a modest but comfortable retirement which they worked for -- and planned for -- most of their lives.
Well guess what?  Seen #6?  That’s YOU and YOUR PARENTS who are going to be paying “the government” to take care of your friends and other people like them that you don’t even know.  That’s right – people who have been responsible, have worked hard, have sacrificed, and have lived within their means and planned for the future are going to be paying for the housing, food, recreation, and health, and much more for those people… many of whom went to universities they couldn’t afford, have lived in homes they couldn’t afford, drove vehicles they couldn’t afford, took vacations they couldn’t afford, bought entertainment systems they couldn’t afford, and generally lived it up while you were working late.  That’s the way socialism of the Democrat brand functions.
How can I inspire them to take action?
I’m not sure you can.  They’ve chosen to ignore reality for so long and are probably set in their ways.  They’ve hand many warnings, starting with parables that are taught to children.  There are so many opportunities to increase your earning power, to research investments, and to save and make investments.  I myself invest through no fewer than three investment vehicles straight out of my paycheck, before I even see the money, including a 401(k).  After that, I invest in other ways through regular, automatic deductions straight from my checking account, including a Roth IRA.  I own my home instead of renting.

There are also so many ways the average person can spend less in order to have more money to save and invest.

You could try asking them questions, like “Hey, my IRA is down a little, but it will come back.  How is yours?”  And when they say they don’t have one, ask, “Why not?”

However, they may be immune to reason.  These are the kind of people Gramm was talking about, or at least should have been.  They think they are owed a good living by “other people”.  And if they do invest, they think they should just be able to throw money anywhere and see a huge return.  These are the kind of people who grow bitter and angry and may even file what I would consider to be frivolous lawsuits as a surrogate for lottery winnings.  These are the whiners.

It is getting worse in part because of rise in people who are raised without a father to explain money, the economy, budgeting, and investing.  Yes, there are women who are smart in these areas, but they aren’t as common as the kind of woman who makes babies with a man who isn’t happily married to her and won’t be around much longer.

People should:

1) Plan ahead. Plans can change, but it is good to have a plan – what kind of lifestyle you want and how you will pay for it.

2) Get the education and training they need AND can afford.

3) Work as much as possible for the highest pay they can charge.  While in school, this will likely mean part time.

4) Spend less than they earn, avoiding interest payments (credit card debt, financing) as much as possible.

5) Consult a financial planner.

6) After building up a liquid emergency fund that can sustain them for six months, save and invest regularly.

7) Vote for smaller government.

8) NOT marry someone who has been financially irresponsible (or even allow them to shack up with them).

9) NOT make babies out of wedlock.

10) Unmarried men in particular should avoid spending a lot of money on dates.  If they hope to get married, any woman they’d want to marry will understand the wisdom of him spending less now in order to save for their future together.  There is no problem with expecting a woman who earns income to pay for herself as one way of keeping costs down.  Men who aren’t looking to get married but instead are dating only for sex should keep in mind that a woman has decided whether or not she is going to fornicate with him before he’s spent a dime.  A few women may be swayed if he spends a bundle, but are they worth it when there are plenty of other women who don’t require the expense?

Don't rely on the government.  SAVE FOR YOURSELF!
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Yet Another Marriage Neutering Piece

Posted by Playful Walrus on Monday, July 21, 2008 6:23:57 PM
“Notice me!  Notice me!  Notice me!”  So much for the demand for privacy.

Gary J. Gates, a senior research fellow at the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law and the coauthor of "The Gay and Lesbian Atlas”, whined in an opinion piece in the Los Angeles Times that couples missing a bride or a groom are not counted by the Census Bureau as “married”.
When same-sex couples wed in California and Massachusetts, they do so believing that their marriage licenses mean that their relationships finally count in the eyes of the state.
So domestic partnerships and legal contracts don’t count?  That must be news to a lot of people.
Unfortunately, they won't count in the eyes of the U.S. Census Bureau.
That’s because that is a function of the federal government, and the federal government – and 48 states – have not neutered marriage licensing via judicial overreach, like two states have.

The Census Bureau is federal.  The federal government does not recognize bridles or groomless “marriages”.  End of story.  Don’t like it?  Use a private research organization.  Same-sex "marriage" is a dead end for the population, which is the primary concern of the census.
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Affirming Marriage Does Not Mean Hating

Posted by Playful Walrus on Monday, July 21, 2008 3:41:22 PM
The San Diego Mayor’s about-face on marriage helped get Proposition 8 on the ballot, writes Los Angeles Times staff writer Jessica Garrison.
The campaign against same-sex marriage in California was treading water until it got help from an unexpected corner: a Republican mayor choking up and announcing he would not betray his gay daughter.
This goes to what I wrote earlier.  In no way would it be a betrayal of his gay daughter to affirm that marriage unites the sexes.  She doesn’t want to join together with a man.  She doesn’t have to.  Nobody has to get married.  But she can’t ask the rest of us to redefine marriage to eliminate the very core of its meaning.  He doesn’t seem concerned that his daughter is asking him to betray marriage, thereby betraying himself.
San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders had promised to oppose same-sex marriage. Then, last fall, hours before he was supposed to veto a City Council motion supporting gay marriage, he called a news conference at which he broke into tears.
Emotions make for bad laws.  This whole thing is an appeal to emotions.  Same-sex couples will feel better if they can legally claim marriage for their relationship.  But that is not our obligation.  In California, these couples can get all of the legalities of marriage, so it really is all about emotion.
One of his daughters is gay, he said, and he just couldn't tell her she did not have the right to get married.
She has always had the same “right” as anyone else.

The article keeps referring to “opponents of same-sex marriage” and “opponents of gay marriage”.  They are not opponents of anything except forcing the rest of us to neuter marriage licenses to dishonor brides or grooms.  They affirm marriage.

The article goes into the history of attempts to put the matter on California ballots.
"My opinions on this issue have evolved significantly," Sanders said. "I just could not bring myself to tell an entire group of people in our community that they were less important . . . less deserving of the rights and responsibilities . . . simply because of their sexual orientation."
I’m for licensing bride-groom marriage only, and I certainly do not think that gay people are less important or less deserving.  This is a false dichotomy.
His voice continuing to shake, he said his daughter Lisa and several of his senior staff members were gay or lesbian.
So what?  That doesn’t change what marriage is, what it isn’t, and what is society’s interest.  Society simply doesn’t have the same interest when men get together without women or vice-versa.
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LA Times Tries to Convince Us Prop 8 is Doomed

Posted by Playful Walrus on Monday, July 21, 2008 1:00:54 PM
Tired of me writing about marriage?  Well, I can keep it up as long as the marriage neutering advocates can.

The Los Angeles Times tries to convince us that the “in-crowd” supports marriage neutering and that those of us who honor the bride-groom construct should give up.  Staff writers Jessica Garrison and Dan Morain report.
A bare majority of California voters would continue to allow gay marriage, according to a new poll released Friday.
Yet again, this extremely sloppy language is used.  Proposition 8 would restore bride-groom marriage licensing to the State of California.  “Gay marriage” would not be banned (and neither would round squares).  Anyone, regardless of sexual orientation, could “marry” someone of the same sex in ceremonies, form legal partnerships, commit to each other, live with each other, etc.  Passing Proposition 8 would not mean that the Gestapo would burst into Metropolitan churches and homes and banquet halls to break up “gay marriages”.
The Field Poll of 672 likely voters found that 51% oppose Proposition 8, which would amend the state Constitution to define marriage as only between a man and woman. Forty-two percent of voters support the November ballot measure.
That’s and awfully small sample.
Poll director Mark DiCamillo said the results indicate a substantial change among voters since 2000, when Proposition 22, a similar ballot measure, was approved with 61% of the vote.
It’s amazing how constant bombardment of propaganda in the media and academia has an effect.
Proposition 22 and other laws that discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation were found to be unconstitutional by the California Supreme Court in May, and gay couples began holding weddings last month.
More sloppy language.  Marriage laws did not discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation.  Nobody asked me my sexual orientation when I got my marriage license.  By the reasoning of this sentence, my wife and I should be able to form a legal domestic partnership, but we can’t because of the bigots who wrote the law "dsciminated on the basis of sexual orientation" and only allow same sex couples or seasons citizens to form domestic partnerships.
"We think this bodes quite well for us," said Jennifer Kerns, spokeswoman for the Protect Marriage campaign. She noted that a Field Poll released in May showed that 54% of Californians opposed Proposition 8, and said the new results "show the opposition has lost a few percentage points and indicates they are losing momentum."
We need to talk basics with the voters we know.  Proposition 8 will not hurt anyone.  Allowing judges to neuter marriage licensing over the voted will of the people does hurt in many ways.  Marriage is how society forms a microcosm of itself to perpetuate itself.  Two men or two women can’t do this.  Protecting marriage protects society by holding up the married mother and father as the ideal parenting construct.  Licensing two people of the same sex as “marriage” is a clear pronouncement that marriage, from a societal interest, can’t be about children.  If marriage can’t be about children, why get married to provide a “better” home for a child?  Shouldn’t we try to discourage out-of-wedlock pregnancies?  And if marriage can't be about children, why stop siblings from marrying?  (Remember - you can't invoke anything about children in a reason to bar sibling marriage.)

Point out to your family and friends, especially if they ever bothered to get married in a church or hope to, that their opinion matters.  If they understand that marriage is something that unites a bride and groom, they should vote that way and not allow anyone they know to demand their vote in proxy, as in “If you love me, you will vote against Prop 8.”  That kind of demand is selfish and the “favor” would never be returned.  Societies that neuter marriage licensing don't care about marriage and raising children within a marriage.  The correlation is there.  Are we that kind of society
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Why I Haven't Donated to McCain

Posted by Playful Walrus on Thursday, July 17, 2008 5:16:56 PM
I get mailers all of the time, supposedly from John McCain, asking for money.  So far, I haven't sent in a dime.  I may open up my wallet if McCain starts effectively promoting conservatism and denouncing the ideas and statements of Obama and other Leftists more than those of his own allies.

Please get word back to McCain.

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Homosexuality Advocates Cause Trouble in UMC

Posted by Playful Walrus on Thursday, July 17, 2008 3:57:49 PM
...and lose one in the California Supreme Court.

The Los Angeles Times, via staff writer Duke Helfand, once again shows that homosexuality advocates aren’t satisfied with browbeating the APA, academia, the legislature, the courts, the media, and business – they continue to demand that churches abandon the Bible to affirm their choices.  In this article, Helfand writes about United Methodist Church ministers defying the Bible and their leadership to conduct “weddings” for brideless couples and groomless couples.
Ministers in Santa Monica, Claremont, Walnut Creek and other cities have already performed ceremonies for gays and lesbians or are planning to do so.

In addition, 82 retired pastors in Northern California signed a resolution in June offering to perform such [ceremonies] on behalf of ministers who feel they can't do so themselves.

Pastors have been emboldened by United Methodist assemblies in California that declared their support last month for the state Supreme Court's recent ruling [neutering marriage licensing].
I seem to recall something about the salt losing its saltiness.
The regional assemblies -- composed of lay leaders and clergy from California and other states -- also urged pastors and congregations to "welcome, embrace and provide spiritual nurture" for gay couples.
What about threesomes?  Or are they bigots?
"I'm tired of being part of a church that lacks integrity," said the Rev. Janet Gollery McKeithen of Santa Monica's Church in Ocean Park, who plans to conduct weddings for two gay couples in August and September. "I love my church, and I don't want to leave it. But I can't be part of a church that is willing to portray a God that is so hateful. I would rather be forced out."
So now God is hateful because He created us male and female?  I don’t know about you, but I’m so thankful He made us different.  He must be a bigot, too, because He deprived "gay couples" of the ability to procreate.  How dare He!  Oh, if only there was some way He could have communicated His will.
The two bishops who oversee United Methodist churches in California -- Mary Ann Swenson and Beverly J. Shamana -- have cautioned ministers against taking matters into their own hands.
Oh, why not?  It’s not like there is a higher authority than themselves… such as church leadership or a God or Bible or anything.  I mean, if someone gets turned on by someone else, who are we to not do everything they ask of us?
The turmoil in the Methodist church is occurring in variations across the Protestant landscape, with some religious authorities glimpsing what they believe are the seeds of rifts, perhaps even schisms, in mainline denominations.
Turmoil in families, turmoil in the courts, turmoil in the churches – everything must be sacrificed for the sodomistic-orgasms of the few.  Can’t expect people to conform to a church they freely joined, right?  It isn't like we have freedom of religion and association and any other churches in this country, like the Metropolitan ones.
At the heart of the dispute is the Book of Discipline. The book calls the practice of homosexuality incompatible with Christian teaching and says "ceremonies that celebrate homosexual unions shall not be conducted by our ministers and shall not be conducted in our churches."

In addition, it excludes "self-avowed practicing homosexuals" from the ministry.
Notice that there is nothing about not accepting gay people into the church – some people fail to note the difference between that and accepting ongoing behavior.
But as defenders of [mock] marriage note, the text also says that "certain basic human rights and civil liberties are due all persons. We are committed to supporting those rights and liberties for homosexual persons."
There’s no conflict there.  There is no right to be married.
Some conservative United Methodists believe that the debate over church rules ignores a deeper issue -- the Bible's prohibitions against homosexuality. "We have lost any ability to have a biblical discussion on the topic," said the Rev. John McFarland, senior pastor of Fountain Valley United Methodist Church.
Somebody still has some sanity.
"This is my flock," she said, adding that the men have been together 40 years, 22 of them as members of her Claremont congregation.
So what?  I could stand in a garage for 40 years and it would never make me a car.  I’ll bet there are straight fornicators who have been in that church for a long time.  That doesn’t make fornication okay.

Meanwhile, Los Angeles Times staff writer Maura Dolan reports that the California Supreme Court actually made the right decision, leaving Proposition 8 on the November ballot, despite the attempt by the marriage neutering activists to prevent the people from having their say.
"Californians do not want their Constitution to single out people to be treated differently," said the statement from Lambda Legal, the National Center for Lesbian Rights, Marriage Equality and the American Civil Liberties Union.
Uh, right.  Typical lie about this issue.  It’s equal access either way.
If approved by voters, Proposition 8, called the "California Marriage Protection Act," would add a provision to the state Constitution that says, "Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California."
Radical idea, I know.
After Wednesday's decision, Kevin Norte, a lawyer who helped inspire one of the legal arguments for removing the ballot initiative, sent friends a note asking that in lieu of a wedding gift they donate to a campaign to defeat the initiative.

Kevin and his longtime partner, Don Norte, went to Tiffany's for wedding rings on the day the court overturned the marriage ban. They plan to exchange vows this week.

"I am getting personal because I will do almost anything to save my marriage," wrote Norte, a Republican. "Wouldn't you?
And the emperor will do anything to save his new clothes.  Register as domestic partners.  You'll have the same legal standing in California.

My guess is that the four justices who voted to force neutered marriage licensing on the people of California didn’t rule to remove Prop 8 from the ballot because they believe: 1) the Proposition will be defeated, or 2) they or some other court will be able to somehow keep it from being implemented or will be able to remove it.  Make no mistake about it – the marriage neutering advocates will keep trying all sorts of courtroom maneuvers.  And regardless, they’ll likely have Massachusetts as a backup.

Related posts:

It Takes a Bride and a Groom to Make a Marriage

More on the Definition of Marriage

Prop 8 Won't Hurt Anyone, But Will Help Restore Power to the People
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You First, Algore

Posted by Playful Walrus on Thursday, July 17, 2008 12:47:32 PM
It’s bad enough that former Presidents are running their mouths in the media.  Now failed Presidential candidates won’t shut up and the media gives them too much attention.

Ron Fournier reports on Algore’s latest.
Just as John F. Kennedy set his sights on the moon, Al Gore is challenging the nation to produce every kilowatt of electricity through wind, sun and other Earth-friendly energy sources within 10 years, an audacious goal he hopes the next president will embrace.
Earth-friendly?  Fossil fuels – which naturally occur on Earth, aren’t Earth-friendly?
Gore said he fully understands the magnitude of the challenge.
Well of course.  I mean, he’s such a genius and all.  Only people like him understand that we can and must stop the planet from warming, and that the only way to do it is through huge new government programs and restrictions.
"This is an investment that will pay itself back many times over," Gore said. "It's an expensive investment but not compared to the rising cost of continuing to invest in fossil fuels."
That’s a load.  If something takes more energy to acquire, process, and distribute than it ever generates, it is a loss!
He likened his challenge to Kennedy's pledge in May 1961 to land a man on the moon by the end of the decade.
Delusions of grandeur.
To meet his 10-year goal, Gore said nuclear energy output would continue at current levels while the nation dramatically increases its use of solar, wind, geothermal and so-called clean coal energy.
That’s stupid.  We should be more like the French, right?  They’ve been using nuclear power quite well.  We need to do that more.

There is no good reason to abandon fossil fuels as long as they are available.  They are there and should be used.  But Algore should try his plan on his own property.
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