DOMA unconstitutional (5-4); Court punts on gay marriage (no standing)

Unanimous:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooper_v._Aaron

 

Doesn't see what the big deal is:

 

By definition a Supreme Court ruling cannot be "unconstitutional."

 

Oddly enough, judicial review as we know it is not explicitly articulated in the Constitution. It came to be after the case Marbury v. Madison. That said, it's pretty firmly entrenched now, and only academics and movement conservatives argue about it now.

 

John Roberts has made his decision ... now let him enforce it ...

 

An earnest question:

Without talking points about the "fabric of society," and without falling back on stump speeces about "libs," can someone explain to me why they object to gay marriage? Or why they think others do? Is it merely the allegedly infallible moral code set forth by the Bible? Do you think it's a Pandora's Box to further moral decay? What? Why? Please. I'm being completely honest here. I want to understand.

 

I come from a heavily fundamentalist family, including my father as a pentecostal minister. He'll tell you simply that homosexuality is an intentional rejection of God's designs for how man should live his life, and anything legitimizing it is tantamount to society rejecting God and our role as God's servants.

 

But, Rick, if I can ask... while accepting your father and the beliefs he has... what makes his beliefs something that the laws of this country should be based on? He doesn't have to respect them, welcome them into his church, etc., and I would have no issue with that. But his morals shouldn't be the guiding force for our nation's laws.

 

This is why I was really, really surprised that Bachmann went the route she did in criticizing the decisions. Huckabee, too. But Bachmann's a lawyer who talks a lot about the Constitution. I was, frankly, startled that she was that overt about the religious implications.

 

You are genuinely surprised to see a statement like that from Bachmann? Really?

 

Please please please don't turn this political.... Great discussion here.

 

I'm surprised she made it the core of her reaction.

I would have expected something that attacked the Court on legal grounds first. Something about states' rights, for example. Then, ancillary to that, the religious implications. She knows that the Court can't make decisions based on morals. She's a lawyer. She's based a lot of her public image on being a fire-breathing Constitution defender. You almost never hear politically savy opponents of gay marriage that explicit. They talk in code. Very similar to creationists.