Speaker John A. Boehner said on Thursday that he expected House Republicans to accept the decision on same-sex marriage that the Supreme Court is scheduled to issue later this year.
“I don’t expect that we’re going to weigh in on this,” Mr. Boehner said. “The court will make its decision, and that’s why they’re there, to be the highest court in the land.”
The statement comes as a bit of a surprise, given the House Republicans’ expensive defense of the Defense of Marriage Act in 2013.
A commenter posted on an earlier item that he was afraid predicting that once the freedom to marry was secured, “rich gay men” would “vote their wallets.” To which I can only say, I hope so. Not because greed is good, but because a prosperous, growing economy that creates real jobs relies on private sector investment and modest, targeted regulation, not higher taxes on investments with ever-expanding regulatory burdens, uncertainties and liabilities.
More. The progressives sound worried. Jonathan Capehart writes:
Finally, the LGBT community must do a better job of making common cause with others seeking equality and freedom from discrimination. Where is the community on immigration? On economic inequality? On racial justice? …
There are poor LGBT Americans. There are millions of people who would benefit from an increase in the national minimum wage who are also LGBT.
By the way, the next time you’re faced with self-checkout at the grocery or drugstore, or an automatic parking garage, or, increasingly, automated self-ordering at fast food restaurants, you can thank those increases in the minimum wage intended to help lower-income Americans but which often end up cutting back their hours and opportunities—or eliminating their employment prospects altogether, especially for the young seeking entry into the workforce.
Furthermore. It’s not just LGBT voters who are feeling more at ease with the GOP. Silicon Valley entrepreneurs are being wooed by Republicans with increasing success, for example. As the Los Angeles Times reports:
Republicans, after musing about the possibility for more than a decade, have finally found a footing in Silicon Valley, ingratiating themselves with tech entrepreneurs who had long eschewed politics in general, conservative politics in particular.
Democrats haven’t yet lost their advantage, but Bay Area techies are writing increasingly sizable checks to GOP candidates and causes.
You betcha that the waning of the marriage issue is making this much easier for them.
18 Comments for “Changing Times”
posted by Thom on
Stephen, I did not say I “feared” rich gay men would vote their wallets, I “predicted” they would. I for one am looking forward to finally having a choice on election day. I have been a loyal Democrat my entire adult life because attaining equal rights trumped all other issues and between the two parties, the Democrats seemed most equipped to get me there, (albeit slowly and cynically). Come June 30th, if SCOTUS rules as expected, my vote will officially be up for grabs. Talk about freedom! While I’m sure I will still lean left for a few election cycles, just knowing I have the option to vote for a Republican without feeling like a “Jew for Hitler” is probably the most liberating sensation imaginable!
posted by Tom Scharbach on
I’m more than willing to vote for Republicans. Until the loonies took over the party, I did, frequently. When the party comes to its senses again, and starts running centrists, I will do so again.
But I will not vote for Republicans who oppose “equal means equal” or who support targeted anti-gay discrimination, and that’s a fact. So it is likely to be a while before I vote Republican again.
posted by Houndentenor on
I actually HAVE voted for Republicans. I voted for Bloomberg once and a couple of judges when I lived in NYC. I did my homework about policies and positions and the history of the candidates. There are sometimes decent Republicans running for office in some parts of the country. I’d even be happy to vote in the GOP primary to help elect Republicans who aren’t batshit crazy (like the ones that represent me in Austin and DC) if any would run. Even in the primaries it’s just a clusterfuck of far right bigotry trying to outdo each other in terms of racism, sexism and anti-gay bigotry.
Also, the religious right is going to push for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage on the platform again in 2016. If anyone thinks they are going to give up just because SCOTUS rules, they must not actually know any of them.
posted by Francis on
Pretty much the same here. Not enthused with their science denial either.
posted by Houndentenor on
It would be nice to have an election in which one candidate wasn’t openly hostile to me. And if we talk about Congress and the Senate, or the state legislature, it’s even worse. (Sometimes there no pro-equality candidate where I live.) Stephen needs to get out of the bubble and realize what his own party actually stands for.
posted by Houndentenor on
This made me chuckle: “a prosperous, growing economy that creates real jobs relies on private sector investment”.
Yes, it does. So why is the financial industry almost solely focused on creating dubious investments that create neither jobs nor wealth for anyone but themselves? And using other people’s life savings (at the moment state pension funds) to line their own pockets with the endgame to leave those investors high and dry after fleecing them? That’s what our economy is based on now. Meanwhile the people that Stephen thinks need more tax cuts are just sitting on their money instead of investing it (or stashing it in the Caribbean like Mitt Romney). Why would we think that taxing them less would create a different outcome than the last tax cut?
I started my adult life as a Republican. And then I watched as they shifted further and further to the right while the Democrats did the same. I’m a little to the left of where I was then, mostly on social issues, but not really on economic ones. I haven’t changed much, but the politics have. Are gays going to start voting for Teavangelical candidates just because gay marriage has been settled by the Supreme Court? Perhaps a few. But mostly the ones that think that way have been voting Republican all along no matter what’s in the platform.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
I had a few thoughts about this overnight:
(1) While I have no doubt that a number of “rich gay men” will feel free to “vote their wallets” after marriage equality is law nationwide, the number of “rich gay men” who don’t already vote Republican is probably not large. Roughly 20-25% of gays and lebians vote Republican already, and I don’t see that number changing much for a few election cycles. “We don’t support equality, but we respect the rule of law …” isn’t a game-changing message, given the party’s history and rhetoric over the last several decades, particularly when it is coupled with messages of strong support for the minority wanting to be exempt from recognizing that the law has changed. Republican percentages may go up a few points, but the party’s past will haunt Republican politicians until a new generation of pro-equality politicians emerges.
(2) For the next several election cycles, anyway, the Republican Party is going to put out a strong undercurrent of anti-gay messaging, no matter what the “establishment” candidates do about messaging. Marriage equality will come, but Ben Carson, Ted Cruz, Mike Huckabee, Rick Perry, Rick Santorum and the like aren’t going to disappear. If anything, we will see a period in which the anti-equality wing of the party gets louder and more insistent. It may be background noise, but it will be noise that rings loud in the ears of gays and lesbians.
(3) The Republican Party is going to have to do more than just go silent on marriage equality to win over large numbers of gays and lesbians. The party is going to have to start supporting equality and supporting gays and lesbians on other issues of legitimate concern. After marriage equality has been won, gays and lesbians are going to turn their attention to other issues and concerns — continued employment and housing discrimination, bullying in the schools, safety on the streets, and a host of other issues that have been back-burnered during the marriage equality fight. Marriage equality will not end bullying in schools. Marriage equality will not eliminate job and housing discrimination. Marriage equality will not end anti-gay violence. And so on. The cold reality is that we have a long way to go. If the party goes silent on marriage equality, but continues to fight gays and lesbians on the emerging (re-emerging?) issues, a lot of gays and lesbians are going to conclude, rightly in my opinion, that a vote for a Republican is a vote against mainstreaming gays and lesbians. Gay and lesbian votes have to be earned, like all votes.
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
(1) It would be nice if we had two major parties (at least) competing for LGBT voters. I am not opposed to healthy competition (and that extends to Republicans, Democrats, Independent and third party candidates).
(2) I have not seen too much analysis on LGBT voter, beyond some exit polling data on gay/lesbian voters. I doubt that marriage equality will mean huge shifts in the voting patterns of LGBT voters.
(3) I find it cute — on a personal note — when conservatives paint themselves as the true defenders of American free market capitalism. …Sort of like the nice Tea Party folk that I meet who talk about the virtues of self-reliance and anti-government rethoric while they collect Social Security, get Medicare/Medicade, work or worked for companies that benefit from government contracts (if not investments) and the like.
posted by Houndentenor on
#3 LOL I don’t think I know a single Teavangelical who isn’t almost entirely dependent on a government program either directly or indirectly. Either Social Security/Medicare, or Disability (often just from being fat and being too mean and racist to keep a job), or a government job (state, local or federal) or working for a business whose main or even only client is the government. They can rant on and on about big government all they want. It’s hilarious. If I weren’t such a nice person I’d wish they got the small government they claim they want (but only want for other people, usually the non-white ones). The cognitive dissonance is something to behold. And oh the hornet’s nest I can stir up by pointing out the simple fact that they are hypocrites.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
I find it cute — on a personal note — when conservatives paint themselves as the true defenders of American free market capitalism.
The reality is that the country is a huge corporate welfare state, created through laws, regulations and policies in which both major political parties are/were complicit, and federal subsidies are the tip of the iceberg.
When you factor in local and state subsidies, and indirect subsidies such as the food stamps on which many/most Walmart employees subsist, the idea of “free market capitalism” is a bad joke.
I am not necessarily opposed to direct and indirect corporate subsidies — the subsidies should be examined, one by one, to see if they still make sense — but with those subsidies come a responsibility, as I see things, to act responsibly.
Conservatives seem convinced that if only we would come to our senses and let corporations operate in a free market environment, unburdened by environmental, health and safety and fair employment regulations, all will be well. Mmmm-kay. But if we do that, then we should consider undoing the corporate subsidies that shelter the corporations from the effects of free market capitalism, putting the money we save to other uses.
posted by Francis on
Agreed. But of course they’ll insist that those corporations “earned” those subsidies, and that we are communists for wanting to deprive them. These fuckers don’t seem to have any thought in their head except red-baiting.
posted by Jorge on
“I don’t expect that we’re going to weigh in on this,” Mr. Boehner said. “The court will make its decision, and that’s why they’re there, to be the highest court in the land.”
Thus isolating even more whichever Republican does choose to weigh in. We wouldn’t want to deny Dan Savage the chance to create yet another Google accident over a future presidential candidate, after all.
Actually, I don’t know.
Roughly 20-25% of gays and lebians vote Republican already, and I don’t see that number changing much for a few election cycles.
I agree. For whatever reason, a significant contingent of gay voters (including myself) think a “game-changer” has already happened. Some people say “rich white gays,” some say “comfortable urban gays”, I say there’s a component of political awareness to it, others say political ideology. In any case, unlike when President Bush successfully appealed to the Latino vote, it was gay voters who made the first move to bridge the gap between themselves and the Republican party. I believe this reflects a keen perception of increased Republican tolerance. Others believe it reflects a willingness to kowtow to continued intolerance.
My point is, the Republican party has never done and is unlikely to begin the same kind of national political outreach toward gay Americans as President Bush embodied toward Hispanic/Latino Americans, and I agree with you Tom on points 1 and 3 that the gay Republican vote will stagnate accordingly. I would like to rebut you on point 2, but you don’t overreach on it so I think you’re right.
posted by Don on
Yeah, claiming only “rich gays” would vote republican does have a bit of a sneer to it. It’s not always about money. But it is a lot of the time. Some are gun afficianados. Some want the smallest government possible. And some rake in the dough and want their tax bill slashed. Some actually support a theocracy. And they’re given a bull horn, usually. Luckily, there aren’t many of those.
Just like Latinos, gays will vote their personal lives not necessarily a plank targeted to their “constituency.” Cubans aren’t big on immigration. That problem has been solved for them. But they do want “tough talk” on “communism.” Others are here legally and have been. They really don’t care if anyone else comes here legally or not. Should they? Well, maybe we should ask 3d generation Europeans how they feel about encouraging immigration. Why should 2d or 3d generation latinos feel differently?
I’m mostly heartened by Rs talk about wealth inequality as of late. I’m not at all interested in taxing everyone for equal outcomes. But the middle class not having much discretionary income (for whatever reason) is a problem (IMHO). It has always been absurd for me to say wealthy people need more money in their pockets to they can hire more people. It ignores basic economics.
We need more people with money in their pockets to purchase more goods/services. Last time I checked, rich people were usually very shrewd. They tend not to build factories and order stuff to sell when no one has any money to buy the things they are going to make.
If this were not true, then why is it corporations are awash in trillions in cash but haven’t hired more people to make/do more things? hmmm, it’s as if they knew there wasn’t a market for more stuff. It’s as if trickle down was some sort of figment of people’s imagination.
Because there has never been a time when there were no mechanisms for those with capital to band together to fill a need for people with cash in hand. That is what a corporation is, after all.
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
One of the major things that we do know — “we” being folks that read what other folks (who study voting patterns and behaviors and methods) publish — is the issue of salience.
I have not seen the salience question applied to LGBT voters, but — simply put — how salient an issue can translate into one much it will impact a voter’s mark on the ballot (and how candidates and campaigns can try to predict and shape voter choices).
It is possible that for some gay voters, gay rights issues are not really salient because they (as an example) don’t expect to be fired from a job or denied housing because they are gay. It does not — necessarily — follow that they are bad people, but they are less likely to view a candidates position as being as important as say, the candidate’s views on other issues.
posted by JohnInCA on
That’s a long-winded way to say “gay Republicans in Blue states can safely vote Red because it can’t hurt them.”
posted by Tom Scharbach on
By the way, the next time you’re faced with self-checkout at the grocery or drugstore, or an automatic parking garage, or, increasingly, automated self-ordering at fast food restaurants …
Oh, dear, Stephen is having to learn to do for himself, instead of having the help do it for him.
… you can thank those increases in the minimum wage intended to help lower-income Americans (but which often end up eliminating their employment prospects, especially for the young seeking entry into the workforce).
Bullshit, Stephen. The drivers behind self-checkout are (a) customer convenience (think ATM’s), (b) enabling technology, and (c) corporate greed.
The federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour. The minimum wage, adjusted for inflation and as a percentage of average income from wages, is significantly lower at present than it was thirty years ago, in 1975. In terms of real dollars and as a percentage of average wages, the federal minimum wages is at 1950 levels.
So what increases, I ask?
posted by Francis on
And how, pray tell, Stephen, does increasing the minimum wage (assuming of course that there is a genuine increase noticeable to a [i]qualified[/i] economist, as opposed to an ideologue) have any deleterious effect on employment prospects? Unless you can provide an explanation which does [i]not[/i] conflate correlation and causation, and which is based on empirical fact, as opposed to supply-side ideology, I will have to assume your argument is disingenuous.
posted by Mike in Houston on
Since I happen to be degreed in “the dismal science” aka Economics, the idea that automation has any causal nexus to the minimum wage is, in polite terms, bunkum.
I would suggest that Stephen read up on Schumpeter, “creative destruction” and the economic determinants of “technology diffusion” before making such sweeping statements — not that this will happen, mind you. To paraphrase from Star Wars (or was it Spaceballs?), “the farce is strong in this one”.