Prop 8 and Judge Vaughn Walker: Gay judges are automatically unqualified

Ed Whelan makes the case in National Review that Judge Vaughn Walker's decision overturning Prop 8 in California be set aside because Walker has recently come out of the closet and thus can't be considered impartial:

Two weeks ago, former federal district judge Vaughn Walker, who ruled last summer in Perry v. Schwarzenegger that California’s Proposition 8 is unconstitutional, publicly disclosed for the first time that he has been in a same-sex relationship for the past ten years. A straightforward application of the judicial ethics rules compels the conclusion that Walker should have recused himself from taking part in the Perry case. Further, under well-established Supreme Court precedent, the remedy of vacating Walker’s judgment is timely and necessary.

As a practical matter, I'm unsure if Whelan's thinking will carry the day. As a broader matter, I find it discomfitting: Would we ask an African-American judge to step aside in a race discrimination case? A female judge to step aside in a sex discrimination case? Not automatically, no. There is a suggestion in Whelan's argument—a spirit that pervades Prop 8 itself—that gay Americans cannot be full citizens with the full rights and duties of citizenship. The only impartial, qualified judge is, well, a heterosexual judge.

But is that really the case? Remember that one of the key arguments made by Prop 8 supporters was that gay marriages threaten straight marriages. Judge Walker cited such arguments in his ruling last year, quoting from the California voter education guide:

And:

The foundation of Prop 8, in other words, is not that gay marriage should be prohibited for any old reason—but because it threatens to undermine female-male marriages.

Seems to me then, that any judge who is married or has been married or who might want to be married someday—be they gay or straight—thus finds him- or herself possibly compromised in this matter. Who is to say a straight judge wouldn't be acting to protect his or her marriage from the destabilizing influence of gay unions? The only person capable of passing a good judgement would be a demonstrably asexual judge—and while that's not impossible to imagine, let's just concede it's unlikely. There's nobody who can escape the appearance of a conflict of interest here if Whelan's logic is being applied to everybody. Otherwise, "straight white male" is the default standard of impartiality; everybody else is just an interest group, compromised by their biases.

The anti-immigration movement: Brought to you by eugenicist John Tanton

One recurring theme in the anti-abortion movement is that organizations like Planned Parenthood are the fruits of bad seeds—irrevocably tainted by events that happened decades ago. And so you see frequent invocations of "eugenicist Margaret Sanger" in these debates. By that standard, then, I guess it's fair to accompany every single mention of the modern anti-immigration movement with a reference to eugenicist John Tanton—who helped create Numbers USA, the Federation for American Immigration Reform, and the Center for Immigration Studies.

Here's a key excerpt from Sunday's profile in the New York Times:

But if anything, Dr. Tanton grew more emboldened to challenge taboos. He increasingly made his case against immigration in racial terms.

“One of my prime concerns,” he wrote to a large donor, “is about the decline of folks who look like you and me.” He warned a friend that “for European-American society and culture to persist requires a European-American majority, and a clear one at that.”

Dr. Tanton acknowledged the shift from his earlier, colorblind arguments, but the “uncomfortable truth,” he wrote, was that those arguments had failed. With a million or more immigrants coming each year — perhaps a third illegally — he warned, “The end may be nearer than we think.”

He corresponded with Sam G. Dickson, a Georgia lawyer for the Ku Klux Klan, who sits on the board of The Barnes Review, a magazine that, among other things, questions “the so-called Holocaust.” Dr. Tanton promoted the work of Jared Taylor, whose magazine, American Renaissance, warned: “America is an increasingly dangerous and disagreeable place because of growing numbers of blacks and Hispanics.” (To Mr. Taylor, Dr. Tanton wrote, “You are saying a lot of things that need to be said.”)

Beyond immigration, he revived an old interest in eugenics, another field trailed by a history of racial and class prejudice.

“Do we leave it to individuals to decide that they are the intelligent ones who should have more kids?” he wrote. “And more troublesome, what about the less intelligent, who logically should have less. Who is going to break the bad news to them?”

I don't believe that everybody who favors tight restrictions on immigration and the forever treatment of immigrant children as outlaws is a racist or a secret eugenicist. (I do think they're wrong.) But by the standards of our modern discourse, though, none of that really matters. John Tanton's ties to modern-day anti-immigration organizations are deeper than Margaret Sanger's to modern Planned Parenthood—he's still alive, and sitting on the board of FAIR. As the Times piece noted, his colleagues in those organizations have been mostly reluctant to distance themselves from him and his views. (Probably out of politeness, like how you tolerate a racist relative at Thanksgiving, but still.) If the fruit of a bad seed is forever tainted, then today's anti-immigration organizations can't remove John Tanton's outrageous racism from their DNA.

Billy Eger returns

I was worried he'd stopped paying attention. Billy Eger's latest:

Your definitely not an accounted,your definitely a communist liberal loser,you have 2 braincells an 1s out looking for the other one.Joel you really can't be this stupid ,but ,then again you think your a journalists,far, far,far from it.its ok,cause soon thier won't be print media an your stupidity will NOT grace the paper anymore unless sum1 goes online too read your immature beliefs,wich I doubt they will do.have a crappy day Asshole .oh all those loser government workers who enslave themselves to the sleeper cell in the whitehouse,fuck them,those people need to get a life ,its all corrupt DEMS an Republicans,don't need to be in public schools or tell me what too eat,drive or breath,this was created by banks that didn't even need to be bailed out. It's the next ponzi scheme,they ran out of tax dollars because of layoffs an jobs leaving country they have to devise way to tax u so they can have their martini in Belize.I feel sorry for stupid people like you,even more for your kids if you have any,they'll probably even laugh at how stupid you are an how they can pull the wool over your eyes an closed mind.later loser,1 more thing ,all you media assholes play with peoples emotions instead of just printing facts.your ALLLLLLLLLLLLLL losers. Fuck off an .........
billy from wickliffe

Today in inequality reading: Barlett and Steele return

In short, corporate America does not come close to paying its fair share of government's cost. Nor, obviously, is it called upon to make any human sacrifice. As for all those hundreds of billions, they simply were and are added to the national debt, a tab that will be borne disproportionately by working Americans.

What kind of corporation escapes responsibility for any of these bills? Carnival Cruise Lines for one, a Miami company whose glitzy megaships have names like Carnival Fantasy, Ecstasy, Elation, and Paradise. From 2005 to 2010, Carnival - the world's largest cruise carrier - racked up $13 billion in profits. The company's tax bill for those years? Chump change of $191 million. That's million. And that included U.S. income tax, foreign income, and local income tax. The overall tax rate came in at 1.4 percent. This even though the ships sail out of Miami and are inspected by the Coast Guard.

Middle America has not fared nearly so well, thanks to a Congress that likes to sock it to ordinary people, the same people who are and will be hammered even more as lawmakers target them to be a scapegoat for the ballooning deficits. Though corporate profits have continued to climb, the wages of working people remain frozen in time. In 2008, according to IRS data, 10 million working individuals and families filed tax returns reporting incomes of between $30,000 and $40,000. Their effective tax rate: 6.8 percent - nearly five times the Carnival rate.

via philly.com

Songs on my iPod with 'America' in the title

• "America" by Neil Diamond.

• "America" by Simon & Garfunkel.

• "America (Reprise)" by Neil Diamond.

• "An American in Paris" conducted by Leonard Bernstein.

• "American Music" by Violent Femmes.

• "The American Patrol" by The Glenn Miller Orchestra.

• "American Wedding" by Gogol Bordello.

Heh.

"When Paul Ryan says his priority is to make sure, he's just being America's accountant ... This is the same guy that voted for two wars that were unpaid for, voted for the Bush tax cuts that were unpaid for, voted for the prescription drug bill that cost as much as my health care bill -- but wasn't paid for," Mr. Obama told his supporters. "So it's not on the level."

via cbsnews.com

We don't have a spending problem. We have a paying problem.

via krugman.blogs.nytimes.com

I don't think we need to bring tax revenues up to Norway levels. But ... this is why I don't trust deficit-reduction plans that involve huge tax cuts. (I could see rate cuts as part of a tax reform package that eliminated loopholes, but Paul Ryan's plan seems aimed more at cutting revenues to government.)