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Respect for Marriage Act • James Campion & The Consequence of Chucking Civil Rights on a Lark

In an age of abject polarization and moronic social issue wrangling, a congressional bipartisan bill to protect the sanctity and legality of marriage equality provided by the landmark 2015 Supreme Court Obergefell v. Hodges ruling that passed through the Senate and will duly be signed into law by the president of the United States is a major deal. At the very least, the law will act as an important bulwark against the radical right-wing fascist current Court, which, according to its goose-stepping ringleader Clarence Thomas, will most assuredly overturn that 2015 decision as blithely as he engineered the dismantling of Roe v Wade, stripping a half-century of settled law that protected women’s reproductive rights from the tyranny of government oppression.

Hooray.
All of this is a good thing. Sure. But is sad and pathetic for a country to have to go to such legal steps to avoid falling backwards, halting its natural progression of moving beyond the iron fist of ignorance and petty political gamesmanship. Its very need to exist is a poor commentary for a purported free nation scrambling to protect the civil rights of tax paying citizens. Yet, even with its positive messaging, the law falls short. As mentioned, it does stop dumb-struck lunatics like Thomas from wreaking havoc as he did with Roe – tossing the country into a cauldron of ungovernable bullshit and costing Republicans dearly in the 2022 midterms and likely alienating future enlightened generations from ever supporting or voting for them ever again. But… come on. We’re in silly land here.

The Respect for Marriage Act is a direct response to the abomination of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act that used bigotry and religious fanaticism (two stalwarts of American repression for 250 years) to make lesser a portion of the citizenry through law, a virtual Jim Crow-level separation of persons due to natural orientation, no less egregious than the color of one’s skin, gender, or creed. Yet, the bill does not require states to allow same-sex marriage, even though that is the current reality under the 2015 Obergefell decision. When this corrupt Supreme Court overturns Obergefell and previous state prohibitions on same-sex marriage come back into effect, the Respect for Marriage Act would require states to recognize marriages conducted in places where it is legal but in no way have to provide the same freedoms in their states. Not to mention the always ridiculous religious exceptions, which is the only way for Republican to be onboard – placating the Evangelical loons, even though some Evangelic council and churches, along with the Mormons, publicly supported the bill. The law would protect nonprofit (that’s a thing?) and religious organizations from having to provide support for same-sex marriages.

Not to get into this argument again, but how these safe-houses of bigotry, misogyny, science-denying, homophobic pedophilia get tax exempt status is beyond understanding even for the most intellectually challenged? Also, I think I can find something in the Bible that makes it impossible to get a speeding ticket anymore. I’m working on it. You can interpret any crazy shit in there.

So, why did twelve senate Republicans support the final approval of the bill? Well, for one, the survival of the crumbling Republican brand is on the line. In other words, the midterms scared the gay-bashing homophobia right out of these dinks. Also, three of the senators, Roy Blunt (Mo.), Rob Portman (Ohio), Richard Burr (N.C.) are retiring next month, while Cynthia Lummis (Wyo.), vehemently anti-gay, understands the landscape (80-percent of Americans now support marriage equality), and moderates like the clueless Susan Collins (Maine), the goofy Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Thom Tillis (N.C.), Mitt Romney (Utah), Shelley Moore Capito (W.Va.), Dan Sullivan (Alaska), Joni Ernst (Iowa) and Todd Young (Ind.) want to get elected again. They rightly read the results of the aforementioned midterms as a big loser for all the social bashing of women and gays.

Thirty-seven Republican senators disagree. But those who voted against the bill are from states or districts where freedom only applies to the size of one’s gun and right-wing media. The most ideologically glaring though is closet-hanger supreme, Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and minority leader, Mitch McConnell (R-KY), both of whom voted against self-interest. The bill also protects inter-racial marriages. McConnell is in an inter-racial marriage. For that matter, so is Clarence Thomas. But he can’t help himself; his wife is a card-carrying fascist and, you know, Thomas is scum. And Graham? I mean…

But the big take away from this historic if not sadly framed bill passing is that Republicans are in big trouble, and they’re about to make a shit-show of their middling majority in the House, make Donald Trump their presidential nominee and sink the whole fiasco once and for all, so they think placating 80-percent of the electorate is a good way to keep breathing. And who can argue? Might work.

For whatever the reasons or cynical political grandstanding, it got done. It’s a start to restoring honor and liberty to a country that turned into a Third World banana republic last summer by making a woman’s uterus ward of the state.
But as my late dad used to say, “One disaster at a time.”
   © James Campion 3rd December 2022
email: realitycheck at jamescampion.com

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James Campion is the Managing Editor of The Reality Check News & Information Desk and the author of “Deep Tank Jersey”, “Fear No Art”, “Trailing Jesus”, "Midnight For Cinderella" and “Y”. +, “Shout It Out Loud – The Story of KISS’s Destroyer and the Making of an American Icon” + “Accidently Like a Martyr – The Tortured Art of Warren Zevon” and published on June 1st, 2022, “Take a Sad Song…The Emotional Currency of “Hey Jude".
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