Category Archives: American politics

Stings, Entrapment, and Hypocrisy

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This weekend’s NYT Week in Review seems largely devoted to the Wide Stance Scandal:

Abby Goodnough writes about open secrets and hypocrisy.

Sarah Kershaw writes about stings and entrapment.

Laura Maconald writes about how tea-room rituals are such as to not pose a menace to the public order.

My commentary: Normally, this ought to be a private scandal, just like Bill Clinton’s ought to have been. What makes Craig’s actions fair game for the media is his hypocrisy in soliciting gay sex (when he voted against gay rights) outside of marriage (when he proclaims support for “family values”). Interestingly, it seems like “family values” stands for nothing more than “anti-gay”, given that senators who commit adultery with women are not being pushed out.

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On a lighter note, I think someone ought to open a gay bar in Idaho called The Wide Stance….

Speaking of gay marriage…

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I was ecstatic to hear that the anti-marriage amendment was defeated in Massachusetts. Marriage equality will continue there! Way to go!

Now, when do we get it in my new home, Washington? We can’t even travel to MA to get married because the state chose to enforce a 1913 law (intended to put the brakes on interracial marriage) that MA will not perform marriages that are not recognized in one’s state of residence. That means that Knox and I have to get legally married in Canada, where there are no residency requirements. As I understand it, the marriage will then be recognized not only in countries that allow gay marriage (Belgium, Canada, the Netherlands, Spain, and South Africa), but also in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New York (these last two don’t yet perform gay marriages but recognize out-of-state marriages).

To be sure, today marks a major milestone, but until equality becomes a non-issue and couples like us do not have to deal with this crazy patchwork of laws and second-class status, the fight will continue.

The full force of citizens

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Howard Zinn on activism to get out of Iraq:

We who protest the war are not politicians. We are citizens. Whatever politicians may do, let them first feel the full force of citizens who speak for what is right, not for what is winnable, in a shamefully timorous Congress.

Timetables for withdrawal are not only morally reprehensible in the case of a brutal occupation (would you give a thug who invaded your house, smashed everything in sight, and terrorized your children a timetable for withdrawal?) but logically nonsensical. If our troops are preventing civil war, helping people, controlling violence, then why withdraw at all? If they are in fact doing the opposite—provoking civil war, hurting people, perpetuating violence—they should withdraw as quickly as ships and planes can carry them home.