More Columnists Skewer Walker and the Media

Over at Townhall.com, several more columns have run in reaction to Walker's ruling on Proposition 8.

Frank Turek's latest was broken into part one and part two.

Before we address the top ten false “facts” asserted by Judge Vaughn Walker, there is one real fact in his opinion that defeats the entire case for his opinion. Here it is:

“The evidence at trial shows that marriage in the United States traditionally has not been open to same-sex couples.”

Since that fact is unquestionably true, how can Judge Walker honestly declare that Proposition 8 violates the Fourteenth Amendment? Certainly no one in 1868 intended the Fourteenth Amendment to redefine marriage.

Oh, but words can mean anything that a judge wants them to mean, apparently.

1. “Sexual orientation is fundamental to a person’s identity and is a distinguishing characteristic that defines gays and lesbians as a discrete group.” (FF 44) This is the most important of the false facts because Walker’s entire case collapses without it. The “fact” is false because it ignores the difference between desires and behavior.

And...

What matters is whether the behavior desired is something the country should prohibit, permit or promote. And that’s a job for the people, not judges.

2. “California has no interest in asking gays and lesbians to change their sexual orientation or in reducing the number of gays and lesbians in California.” (FF 47) Other than helping them avoid disease and live longer, absolutely no reason.

And...

3. “Same-sex couples are identical to opposite-sex couples in the characteristics relevant to the ability to form successful marital unions.” (FF 48) What does “successful” mean? It has nothing to do with children according to Judge Walker.

And...

In another instance of special pleading, Judge Walker ignores the evidence that at least half of committed homosexual relationships are open as even the New York Times reported. (Other studies found even higher rates of promiscuity and infidelity.)

[Much more after the jump.]

From Part Two:

6. “No credible evidence supports a finding that an individual may, through conscious decision, therapeutic intervention or any other method, change his or her sexual orientation.” (FF 46) I guess thousands of ex-gays just don’t exist in Judge Walker’s special-pleading universe. Neither does renowned Columbia University psychiatrist, Dr. Robert Spitzer, who concluded that some highly motivated individuals can change their orientation from homosexual to heterosexual through reorientation therapy.

And...

But does one really need a study to know that Walker is wrong? Was your father different as a parent than your mother? To say no is laughable

He then has questions for Walker, including this point we have made:

Why do you assert that men and women are interchangeable as parents but not as sex partners? After all, if gender really is irrelevant to marriage as you maintain—if men and women are interchangeable—then why argue for same-sex marriage at all? Why not just tell homosexuals, “Gender is irrelevant to marriage, so instead of making a fuss, why not just go ahead and marry someone from the opposite sex”?

Why not? Because when it comes to their own personal gratification, homosexual activists like Judge Walker clearly recognize the big difference between the sexes. But when it comes to the more important priority of raising children, they say there is no difference between the sexes.

Janet M. LaRue:

The good news is that Walker committed the supreme judicial faux pas by flipping off the U.S. Supreme Court in the process.

The case of Perry v. Schwarzenegger shouldn’t have gone to trial. It should have been decided with two sentences: “Judgment is entered for defendants. The Supreme Court held in Baker v. Nelson that a state law denying same-sex couples a marriage license does not violate the U.S. Constitution.”

Walker's 136-page opinion does support my general theory that the nuttier the opinion, the more trees die in order to explain it. Walker consumes 108 pages on his “findings of fact,” most of which are irrelevant suppositions, circular reasoning, erroneous and downright dippy.

And...

Note the double standard. Walker decreed that it’s wrong for seven million Californians to make a moral judgment about who can marry. But it’s proper for him to substitute his moral judgment about who can marry as the “law” of California.

And...

Kennedy limited Lawrence to the facts of the case—a Texas statute that criminalized homosexual sodomy in private, which is far afield from a civil law defining who can marry in California. Kennedy wrote:

“It does not involve whether the government must give formal recognition to any relationship that homosexual persons seek to enter.”

Furthermore, Walker doesn’t mention the one “on point” case, Baker v. Nelson (1972), in which the Court rejected a constitutional challenge to a state law limiting marriage to a man and a woman. The Court dismissed the appeal of a Minnesota Supreme Court case “for want of a substantial federal question,” which constitutes a decision on the merits of the case, binding on all lower courts.

The Supreme Court held in Hicks v. Miranda that a summary dismissal is binding precedent on all lower federal courts. "[U] ntil the Supreme Court should instruct otherwise, inferior federal courts had best adhere to the view that the Court has branded a question as unsubstantial.”

Robert Knight addresses the "ban" wording that has been erroneously thrown around:

The media have turned the meaning of marriage on its head. Calling the law a “ban” says its only purpose is to discriminate against homosexuals. By this reasoning, any law or policy that defines something is a “ban.”

But a license to practice law or medicine is not a “ban” on those without law or medical degrees. It is recognition of the qualifications. A state’s requirements for a driver’s license are not a “ban” on the under-aged or the untrained. A college degree is not a “ban” on anyone who did not matriculate.

Marriage as the union of a man and a woman predates all other human institutions. It was not created to annoy homosexuals. Marriage laws exclude all but one man and one unrelated woman. Yet, I have not seen any media report the demise of the “incest ban,” or the “polygamy ban” or the “bestiality ban.” Just because homosexual activists have led the assault is not an excuse to pretend that marriage has only the purpose of excluding them.

Mario Diaz:

As the trial went on Judge Walker neither addressed his personal issues nor tamed his approach. At one point, he even allowed the trial to devolve into a sort of bashing of Christian doctrine. The official doctrinal statements from the Southern Baptist Convention and the Roman Catholic Church were condemned as bigoted for holding to a Biblical view of marriage. This, of course, had nothing to do with whether Prop. 8 is unconstitutional, but Judge Walker found it amusing for, as we will discuss, he alludes in his opinion that it is those religious bigots and their distortions that are the real reason that seven million Californians voted so “irrationally” to protect marriage.

As you would expect, the decision itself is a reflection of this charade. Judge Walker dismisses any evidence put forth by supporters of traditional marriage as irrational, unreliable, and not credible, while declaring all the pro-homosexual “marriage” testimony entirely reliable. Judge Walker declares the testimony of David Blankenhorn, the founder and president of the Institute for American Values, who graduated magna cum laude from Harvard with a degree in Social Studies, wrote two books on marriage, fatherhood, and family structure and has co-edited another five books on the topic, “should be given essentially no weight.” Of Kenneth P. Miller, professor of government at Claremont McKenna College, the “all-powerful” judge declares, “while Miller has significant experience with politics generally, he is not sufficiently familiar with gay and lesbian politics specifically to offer opinions on gay and lesbian political power.” You know, you can be a homicide detective, but if you have not killed anyone, how are you supposed to know anything about murder?

And...

But the Judge wants you and me to know he is not creating a new right. He specifically rejects the idea of a right to same-sex “marriage,” opting to redefine the word marriage by judicial fiat to include everything. While that is very convenient, it’s not very clever, as everyone can see that he is creating a new right. It would be like him redefining the word “tree” to include cars in a law protecting trees from removal in a certain land. Judge Walker would be very comfortable arresting you for removing junked cars from the particular land: “I’m not creating new law, the word ‘trees’ include cars, it is very clear.”