Michael-In-Norfolk - Coming Out in Mid-Life
Thoughts on Life, Love, Politics, Hypocrisy and Coming Out in Mid-Life
Monday, March 18, 2024
Sunday, March 17, 2024
Christofascists Attack Youngkin for Same Sex Marriage Approval
If Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin (R) had his eyes on higher office, his decision Friday almost certainly put those dreams out of reach.
To the shock of voters across the Commonwealth, Youngkin, who campaigned as a born-again Christian and spent many a Sunday in sanctuaries like Cornerstone Chapel’s, committed the ultimate betrayal — signing a same-sex marriage bill that was not only completely unnecessary but a stinging rebuke of conservative values.
The move, announced in a Friday afternoon news dump to avoid attention, was called “symbolic” by even LGBT activists since the Supreme Court’s Obergefell ruling and Congress’s Respect for Marriage Act already grant the “rights” supposedly reaffirmed here. Youngkin’s decision was even more astounding considering that he’d already panned the need for such legislation two years ago.
People had no reason to suspect that the governor’s opinions had changed, since as recently as last Wednesday, Youngkin hadn’t taken a public position on the proposal. And yet, in what local reporters are calling a “surprising twist,” the homegrown governor inked his name to the law, which essentially says that marriage licenses must be given to any two people “seeking a ‘lawful marriage’ regardless of gender, race or sex and that Virginia will recognize such marriages as valid.”
His office pathetically tried to explain away the move as a defense of religious freedom. “The bill adds First Amendment protections to the code of Virginia,” Youngkin spokesman Christian Martinez claimed — apparently forgetting that the First Amendment already applies to the state.
While the governor’s staff cheered the bill’s conscience rights for pastors, it offers no such shield for bakers, photographers, teachers, web designers, adoption agencies, Christian schools, and so many others. A few throwaway sentences clarifying that ministers won’t be forced to perform actual wedding ceremonies do nothing to resolve the hammer this legislation takes to everyday people. . . . . Thanks to Governor Younkin, anyone who believes in marriage as human history defines it is a sitting duck — a prime target for persecution, marginalization, and even civil action.
The most outrageous part of it all is that Youngkin had no reason to consider this proposal in the first place. He threw away his conservative credentials for what is ultimately a Democratic messaging bill.
At the end of the day, whatever Youngkin thinks he’s gained from this treason is nothing compared to what he’s lost with his base: trust.
“I voted for Glenn Youngkin,” Family Research Council’s Meg Kilgannon told The Washington Stand, “but I didn’t vote for this.”
Setting aside the religious arguments for a moment, she explained, “on a practical and political level, the signing of this bill is a total fail. The Democratic Party is seeking to define the rules of engagement for GOP governors by creating this situation for Governor Youngkin. When he signs a bill like this, it sets a precedent for other Republican elected officials that it is okay to capitulate — maybe even necessary — to bow to LGBTQ+ lobbying groups.”
Conservatives, unfortunately, have a lot of recent experience being stabbed in the back by Republicans. From Mike Pence throwing Hoosiers under the bus over religious freedom in 2015 to South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem (R) and Ohio Governor Mike DeWine (R) killing bills to protect kids from gender mutilation, GOP careers have been made and broken on the backs of marriage and sexuality. More than a year after the vote, Republican members of Congress are still being censured by state parties for siding with the far-Left’s same-sex marriage law — the repercussions of which continue to this day as double-crossing incumbents lose critical campaign cash and endorsements. The heat back home has been so intense that two congressmen publicly recanted their vote.
And yet, in this messy aftermath, Youngkin has made the fatal decision to embrace what his party’s platform has rejected. The man who stood in Pastor Gary Hamrick’s church and declared, “At the cornerstone of everything that we do is our faith in Him” has proven to be just another insincere, weak-kneed politician.
People want Republicans to believe in marriage that “this ship has sailed,” Cobb shook her head. They tell elected officials, “‘Don’t be on the [wrong] side of this. Just come along and sign these bills.’ But I think it’s going to matter in primaries,” she warned. “I really do. . . . It’s the time to tell leaders like Glenn Youngkin that when it comes to representing Republicans, cowards need not apply.
Saturday, March 16, 2024
Social Security and Medicare Are on the Ballot in November
A few days ago, the Biden administration released its budget proposal for the 2025 fiscal year (which begins in October). Given that Republicans control the House, this budget isn’t going to happen, so it serves mainly as a statement of principles and intent.
But that doesn’t make the budget irrelevant. It clearly signaled Democrats’ vision for the future — in particular, their belief that we can preserve the solvency of Social Security and Medicare by raising taxes on high incomes rather than by cutting benefits. And it draws a stark contrast with the vision of Donald Trump, who appeared to say during an interview with CNBC that he would seek to cut those programs.
You might be tempted to dismiss Biden’s assurances on safety net programs as boilerplate — don’t Democrats always promise to protect Social Security and Medicare?
But Biden has staked out a significantly stronger position than that of Barack Obama, who, as president, all too often seemed to be in the intellectual thrall of those I used to call the Very Serious People, opinion leaders who a decade ago dominated inside-the-Beltway discourse and were obsessed with the need for entitlement reform — which effectively meant cuts to Social Security and Medicare. Obama’s 2014 fiscal year budget teased entitlement reform to the point that even John Boehner, then the Republican House speaker, was prompted to say Obama “does deserve some credit for some incremental entitlement reforms that he has outlined in his budget.”
Biden is saying that none of this is necessary. This is a significant move to the left — although it’s also a move to the center, in the sense that voters never agreed with the elite conventional wisdom that benefits must be cut and a majority consistently say the rich don’t pay enough in taxes.
What explains this toughening up of the Democratic position? For one thing, entitlement programs look a lot more fiscally sustainable than they used to.
A decade ago, projections of spending generally assumed that health care costs would continue their historical pattern of rising much faster than G.D.P., making Medicare and other health programs increasingly unaffordable. In fact, however, Medicare costs, in particular, have been rising much less than expected. . . . . cost reduction efforts in the Affordable Care Act probably played a role.
We still have an aging population, which means a rising ratio of retirees receiving benefits to workers paying taxes; the Congressional Budget Office expects combined spending on Social Security and Medicare to rise by about three percentage points of G.D.P. over the next 20 years. But this cost rise, while not small, is moderate enough that it could be offset with higher revenues.
At the same time, the Very Serious People have lost much of their influence. Their repeated predictions of fiscal crisis kept not coming true. The inflation surge of 2021-22 temporarily boosted the credibility of critics of government spending, but this credibility evaporated when dire warnings about persistent stagflation proved utterly wrong.
All of this has, I believe, encouraged Biden and his officials to stake out a firm position opposing cuts to America’s social safety net — indeed, calling for increased benefits, to be paid for with increased taxes on corporations and high-income individuals.
What about Trump? Here’s what he said: “There is a lot you can do in terms of entitlements, in terms of cutting and in terms of also the theft and the bad management of entitlements.” If you have trouble parsing that, it’s not you; it’s him.
And desperate follow-up attempts by the Trump campaign to insist that “cutting” didn’t actually mean, well, “cutting” weren’t convincing.
Incidentally, Social Security sees very little fraud, and if Medicare is very badly managed, how has it become so effective at cost control?
What that could mean in practice, however, is that if he[Trump] gets back to the White House, he’ll do for Social Security and Medicare what he did in his almost successful attempt to replace Obamacare: leave the drafting of legislation to right-wing ideologues who do understand how the programs work — and who want to gut them.
One final point: Trump’s plan for a draconian crackdown on immigration would be a disaster on many fronts, but one important consideration is that it would have a catastrophic impact on the future finances of Social Security and Medicare. Why? Because at this point, immigration is crucial for growth in the working-age population, whose taxes support retirees.
So will Social Security and Medicare be on the ballot this November? Definitely. Biden has a clear plan to preserve these programs; Trump, wittingly or unwittingly, would probably help wreck them.