Lt. Gov. Northam Casts Tie-Breaking Vote for Gay-Rights Bill

Yours truly with Northam at a fundraiser

In another example that elections do truly matter, Lt. Governor Ralph Northam yesterday cast the tie breaking vote in the Virginia Senate on a bill that would provide employment protections to LGBT state employees.  Currently, unless one is a federal employee or works for a federal contractor covered by Barack Obama's executive ENDA order, LGBT Virginians have absolutely ZERO employment protections.  The bill will now go to the GOP dominated House of Delegates where it faces an uncertain fate as the Virginia GOP in fealty to the haters at The Family Foundation ("TFF") continues to wage war against gays, women and the poor.  Here are highlights from the Virginian Pilot on yesterday's vote:

Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam cast a tie-breaking vote Tuesday to pass a bill that prohibits state agencies from discriminating in employment based on sexual orientation.

SB785 by Sen. Donald McEachin, D-Henrico County, tied on a 19-19 vote in the Senate. Two Democrats were absent, but two Republicans joined the remaining 17 Democrats in supporting the bill. They were Sen. Jill Holtzman Vogel, R-Fauquier County, and Sen. John Watkins, R-Midlothian.
The vote was the first tie-breaker of this year's session.

Northam's office issued a statement on his behalf: "Employment discrimination in any form is truly unacceptable, and the Commonwealth should be held to a high standard in this regard."

 It goes without saying that the two Republicans who voted for passage will likely find themselves on TFF's hit list.

Tuesday Morning Male Beauty

Chaos Would Follow If the GOP Actually Repealed Obamacare

Today the GOP controlled House of Representatives will again vote to repeal the Affordable Health Care Act, a/k/a Obamacare.  Of course, the Congressional Republicans have no proposed alternative to Obamacare and no plan how to deal with the millions of Americans who would lose healthcare coverage.  Of course, they seemingly don't care about these individuals and families since they most likely view them as part of the 47% who are "takers."  Added to this indifference is the fact that in the minds of many in the GOP, these Americans are minorities, so they truly do not matter.  So much for adherence to the message of Christ.  Mother Jones looks at the chaos that would ensue if the GOP did succeed in its repeal efforts.  Here are article highlights:

On Tuesday, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives plans to vote once again to repeal the Affordable Care Act. It will be the 55th time House GOPers have voted to eliminate or impede the health care reform law, but the very first opportunity for freshman Republicans to register their opposition to Obamacare in the congressional record.

But with each repeal vote, the politics of rolling back the Affordable Care Act become more fraught. After all, the law is now enmeshed with the US health care system. "Talk of repealing the Affordable Care Act is like talk of repealing the interstate highway system," says Timothy Jost, a health care law expert at the Washington and Lee University School of Law. "I mean in theory you could do it. Nobody would want to live with it."

Since President Barack Obama will never sign legislation repealing his signature accomplishment, a vote to strike down the law is largely symbolic. But what if, in some parallel universe perhaps, repeal passed?

"If you with a stroke of a pen took the Affordable Care Act away and there was no transition period, there would essentially be havoc in the markets," says Linda Blumburg, a health care policy analyst.

[H]ealth care experts have been crunching the numbers to figure out what would happen if the Supreme Court dismantles Obamacare in states that rely on the federal government to run their healthcare marketplaces. Though the Supreme Court scenario, which would halt the subsidies to people purchasing insurance in the federally-run marketplaces, is not the same as full repeal, it helps paint the picture of what would happen. And the picture is not pretty. If the Supreme Court stopped subsidies from flowing to the 34 states that did not establish their own exchanges, 8.2 million fewer people would have coverage by 2016. . . Next year, the number of people insured through purchasing private plans would drop by 69 percent.

Jost says. "Basically, you would have a lot of people die because they couldn't get health care."

This is just the tip of the iceberg. A roll back of the Medicaid expansion would cause millions more Americans to lose their coverage and create mayhem for state governments. Without the ACA to plug the so-called "donut-hole" for prescription drugs, seniors would see their drug bills go up.

A Supreme Court decision against Obamacare would cost millions of Americans their coverage, but full repeal by Congress would be even more devastating. Health care experts describe a state of complete chaos were the ACA to simply disappear from the books.

Repeal would be bad for insurers as well as customers by causing at least short-term turmoil for insurance companies. Without an individual mandate and without subsidies to make insurance affordable, younger, healthier people would likely drop their coverage, leaving insurers to cover older, sicker people with more health-care needs.

Republicans are starting to realize that—even for a symbolic vote of protest against Obamacare—the reality is that repeal alone is not an option.

And for the first time, the bill the House plans to vote on this week requires that the relevant House committees draft replacement legislation for the law. And, though not currently in the text of the bill, its sponsor, Rep. Bradley Byrne (R-Ala.), plans to introduce an amendment to the bill that would delay repeal for 180 days to give Republicans time to craft a replacement, according to a Byrne aide.

GOP Base Lunacy and the Measles Vaccine Debate

More and more the base of the Republican Party displays fear of modernity and scientific truths and in the name of "parental rights" refuse to expose their children to public schools and more dangerously, modern vaccines to avoid preventable diseases.  One of the results of this backwardness is the current measles outbreak which is being fueled by those who  refuse to have their children vaccinated.  To me, it is symptomatic of the lunacy that has become synonymous with today's Republican Party.  It is also typical of far right Christians who are among the most self-centered and selfish people one will encounter despite all the claims of piety and adherence to the Gospel message.  They truly, in my view, do not give a damn about how they endanger others.  Now, would be GOP presidential candidates are being pushed to take positions as to whether the public welfare outweighs pandering to those who live in a fantasy world.  The New York Times looks at the issue.  Here are highlights:

WASHINGTON — The politics of medicine, morality and free will have collided in an emotional debate over vaccines and the government’s place in requiring them, posing a challenge for Republicans who find themselves in the familiar but uncomfortable position of reconciling modern science with the skepticism of their core conservative voters.

As the latest measles outbreak raises alarm, and parents who have decided not to vaccinate their children face growing pressure to do so, the national debate is forcing the Republican Party’s 2016 presidential hopefuls to confront questions about whether it is in the public’s interest to allow parents to decide for themselves.

Gov. Chris Christie’s trade mission to London was suddenly overshadowed on Monday after he was quoted as saying that parents “need to have some measure of choice” about vaccinating their children against measles.

Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, a physician, was less equivocal, telling the conservative radio host Laura Ingraham on Monday that parents should absolutely have a say in whether to vaccinate their children for measles.

The vaccination controversy is a twist on an old problem for the Republican Party: how to approach matters that have largely been settled among scientists but are not widely accepted by conservatives.

It is a dance Republican candidates often do when they hedge their answers about whether evolution should be taught in schools. It is what makes the fight over global warming such a liability for their party, and what led last year to a widely criticized response to the Ebola scare.

There is evidence that vaccinations have become more of a political issue in recent years. Pew Research Center polls show that in 2009, 71 percent of both Republicans and Democrats favored requiring the vaccination of children. Five years later, Democratic support had grown to 76 percent, but Republican support had fallen to 65 percent.

[A]sked about immunization over the weekend in an interview on the NBC News program “Meet the Press,” Mr. Obama urged parents to “get your kids vaccinated.”

Hillary Rodham Clinton also weighed in with a jab at vaccine naysayers, writing Monday night on Twitter, “The science is clear: The earth is round, the sky is blue, and #vaccineswork.”

The issue has more political potency among conservative voters who are highly skeptical of anything required by the government.

The vaccine question surfaced in the 2012 Republican primary when rivals of Rick Perry, then the Texas governor, pounced on him for issuing an executive order requiring sixth-grade girls to be vaccinated against the human papillomavirus . . .

[T]he debate is not one-sided for Republicans. Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, also a possible 2016 candidate, was asked on Sunday about vaccinations on the ABC News program “This Week,” and insisted that the science was clear and convincing. “Study after study has shown that there are no negative long-term consequences,” he said. “And the more kids who are not vaccinated, the more they’re at risk and the more they put their neighbors’ kids at risk as well.”

Asked about immunizations again later on Monday, Mr. Paul was even more insistent, saying it was a question of “freedom.” He grew irritated with a CNBC host who pressed him and snapped: “The state doesn’t own your children. Parents own the children.”

Rand Paul's comment is very distressing. NO ONE owns children.  They have every right to be protected from the ignorance of their parents and from their parent's poisonous religious beliefs.  Yet the far right sees children as chattel property to be mistreated and abused, physically and psychologically as deranged parents see fit.  This mindset needs to be eradicated.

Monday Morning Male Beauty

Why Obama’s New Budget Will Pressure Republicans

Today, Barack Obama will release his proposed budget.  A budget that the GOP obstructionists will say is "DOA" - dead on arrival.  In terms of actually being adopted, the GOP obstructionists may be right, but that doesn't mean the proposed budget won't have a strong political role that will live on.  If the GOP rejects the proposals, then - God forbid - the Congressional Republicans will have to submit a counter proposal that will show their hand to voters.  It's easy to just say "no," but fashioning something that can be passed and survive a veto threat is something all together different.  A column in the Washington Post looks at this reality.  Here are excerpts:

When President Obama releases his budget Monday, the words “dead on arrival” will be widely incanted because they are part of a quasi-religious Beltway ritual.  This year, those words will be misleading.

No one expects Obama’s budget to be enacted as he proposes it. Republicans responded even to early outlines of his plan with a wall of opposition. But this time around is different because, paradoxically perhaps, the fact that Republicans control both the House and Senate makes Obama’s role more rather than less important.

Now, Obama’s plan will be the main public alternative to whatever the Republicans decide to do.

Moreover, the Republicans are responsible for passing a budget through two houses of Congress, so differences within the GOP that could be finessed in the past will have to be dealt with openly.

The most obvious will be on whether to continue cuts in the defense budget prescribed under the so-called sequester enacted in 2011. GOP defense advocates want to raise Pentagon spending substantially, libertarians want to keep both domestic and military spending low, and many mainstream conservatives will try to cut domestic spending even more to accommodate defense increases.

Obama has declined to offer premature concessions to the Republicans in his own proposal, which further clarifies the stakes. At the same time, he has made things trickier still for his opponents by putting many of his ideas in a form that Republicans have supported in the past. That’s true even of some of his tax proposals.

The president will call this bluff by putting $1.8 trillion in long-term deficit reduction on the table. But most of it will come on the revenue side. His argument here is straightforward: The bulk of the deficit reduction in the deals reached since 2011 has come from cuts in discretionary spending — that is, almost everything except the big retirement programs — which is now at its lowest level, as a share of gross domestic product, in decades. 

The deficit hawks who aren’t part of the ideological assault on the public sector know that the basic functions of government have already been cut too much and that some new domestic spending, particularly for infrastructure, is essential.

[T]he biggest challenge to Republicans may be whether they are willing to go along with Obama on ideas that are plainly in their wheelhouse. One small but significant hope: Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) have been pushing the idea that we need more evidence-based policy making, and Obama is joining their campaign.

Republicans have tried hard to tout their concern about income stagnation and an increasingly frozen class structure. Obama will be pushing for a new initiative, “The Upward Mobility Project,” to provide more flexibility to local officials in a set of government programs if they can show how their efforts will help people climb occupational and income ladders. Projects of this sort are exactly what we should be thinking about.

Obama’s opening bid ought to be the start of a back-to-basics debate — an argument that will extend into the 2016 campaign — over what we want government to do and how we propose to pay for it.

GOP's Huckabee Compares Being Gay to Drinking and Swearing

If readers haven't figured it out, I view Mike Huckabee to be a foul douche bag who is on a quest to subvert constitutional government and, if allowed, he would  impose his version of a Chriastian variant of Sharia law on the nation.  Anyone who falls for his attempts at folksy populism is either an idiot or naive beyond belief.   In his latest slight to LGBT Americans Huckabee has again said that being gay is a "lifestyle" - just like drinking or swearing.  As I've noted before, anyone who equates sexual orientation to a "lifestyle" choice is a bigot or so ignorant they don't belong in any elected office.  CNN looks at Huckabee's latest insult to gays.  Here are highlights:

Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee says expecting Christians to accept same-sex marriage is "like asking someone who's Jewish to start serving bacon-wrapped shrimp in their deli."

He also called homosexuality part of a lifestyle, like drinking and swearing.

The former Arkansas governor, winner of the 2008 Iowa caucuses and likely 2016 contender's comments came during an appearance Sunday on CNN's "State of the Union," as he defended an excerpt from his new book in which he says he has friends and associates who are gay.

He also offered a nod to legislation that some conservatives have advocated on the national and state levels protecting businesses from discrimination claims for adhering to their owners' religious views. 

"I'd like to think that there's room in America for people who have different points of view without screaming and shouting and wanting to shut their businesses down," he said. "What worries me in this new environment we're in, it's not just that someone might disagree, they don't want to argue with me, even take a different point of view. They want to close someone's business down." 

Huckabee pointed to President Barack Obama's 2008 opposition to same-sex marriage, but said there's no chance he'll ever drop his opposition to gay marriage.

"This is not just a political issue. It is a biblical issue. And as a biblical issue -- unless I get a new version of the scriptures, it's really not my place to say, OK, I'm just going to evolve," Huckabee said. 

If anything is a "lifestyle choice" it is adhering to fairy tales written 2000+ years ago by ignorant goat herders and embracing ignorance rather than have to think and make moral decisions of one's own.  The Christofascists want respect and deference but don't think they have to show respect to anyone else.  The sense of entitlement and selfishness is stunning.

Sunday Morning Male Beauty

Is Marijauna the New Gay Marriage for the GOP?

As the Republican Party has sold its soul to please the Christofascists and their Tea Party fist cousins it has increasingly alienated younger voters, particularly on the issue of same sex marriage.  With the marriage equity battle seemingly lost (hopefully the Supreme Court will end it once and for all come June), some suggest that the issue of legalization of small amounts of recreational marijuana may be the new issue that drives younger and moderate voters from the GOP.  Even in Virginia polls suggest that a majority of voters support such a move.  A piece in Politico looks at this new hurdle for the GOP.  Here are excerpts:

Marijuana is shaping up to be the new gay marriage of GOP politics — most Republicans would rather not talk about it, except to punt to the states.

But when it comes to the 2016 presidential race, a series of legalization ballot initiatives — and a certain outspoken Kentucky senator — could make it harder for the Republican field to avoid the conversation.

When asked to articulate their positions on recreational marijuana, several potential GOP 2016 candidates have tried to strike a tricky balance: stress the downsides of pot use and the upsides of states’ rights. Some have indicated their openness to decriminalizing pot, at least in their state, but none favors outright legalization.

Marijuana may not stimulate the same kind of passion as the debate over same-sex marriage. Still, a majority of Americans support legalizing pot, and young people — who tend to turn out more for presidential elections than midterms — are especially keen on it.

The “leave it to the states” stance allows potential GOP candidates to stake out a relatively safe middle ground between an older conservative base that disapproves of marijuana use and a general-election electorate and libertarian wing that prefers legalization. The states’ rights approach also allows GOP candidates to express some openness to medical marijuana and criminal justice reform and argue against devoting costly resources for federal enforcement.

At least five states are preparing to vote on legalization of recreational marijuana in 2016 — Arizona, California, Maine, Massachusetts and Nevada. There are efforts to put the issue on ballots in Florida, Missouri and Montana. Colorado, Washington state, Oregon and Alaska already have voted to legalize recreational marijuana, as has Washington, D.C.

President Barack Obama’s administration has basically tried to avoid what’s becoming a murky legal issue. The Justice Department announced in 2013 that it wouldn’t block recreational and medical marijuana in states that adopted legalization measures; while a federal cannabis ban remains, the administration has largely opted not to enforce it in states that have voted to legalize.

Some advocates have downplayed the parallels between same-sex marriage and marijuana legalization. While recreational cannabis has found its success on the ballot, gay marriage has been decided mostly in state legislatures and courts.

Still, both movements have successfully used state-based models, increasing pressure for federal action. The Supreme Court will decide later this year whether same-sex marriage is a constitutional right.

One Republican outspoken on marijuana is Paul, who has made major overtures to young people and minorities. The Kentucky senator, a favorite in the GOP’s libertarian wing, is the highest-profile Republican to support federal decriminalization and the party’s only potential presidential candidate to do so.

“I don’t want to put our kids in prison for it,” Paul said of marijuana in December. “So if your kid was caught selling marijuana or growing enough that it’s a felony conviction, they could be in jail for an extended period of time. They also lose their ability to be employable. So I want to change all of that.”

The senator’s stance could prove a vexing problem not just for fellow Republicans but also Hillary Clinton. The likely Democratic 2016 frontrunner has been relatively quiet on the issue, asking for a “wait and see” approach to the experiments in Colorado and Washington state and offering some support for medical marijuana.

Although most Americans support marijuana legalization, just 39 percent of Republicans and 31 percent of conservatives do, according to a recent Gallup poll. Another survey shows that 16 percent of Republicans in Iowa, the first presidential nominating state, favor legalization.

The GOP’s internal struggle over the issue is playing out in Congress, where a group of Republicans — led by House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers of Kentucky and Rep. Andy Harris of Maryland — pushed for a provision included in the December $1.01 trillion spending bill that aims to stop the marijuana legalization measure passed in Washington, D.C.

Exxon Mobil Finaslly Adds Employment Protections for Gays

Before it was acquired by Exxon, Mobil Oil had a full compliment of pro-LGBT polices.  All of those went away after Exxon took control and for years Exxon resisted reinstituting the policies.  Now, perhaps pushed by Barack Obama's non-discrimination executive order applying to all federal contractors, Exxon-Mobil has at last restored LGBT employment protections.  Think Progress has details.  Here are highlights:

For over a decade, ExxonMobil shareholders and company officials have repeatedly voted against extending corporate policy to protect LGBT people from discrimination, earning it the Human Rights Campaign’s lowest ranking for LGBT inclusion among the country’s largest businesses. That reputation just came to an end, as the company has officially added “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” to its officially protected classes.

The company’s newly updated Standards of Business Conduct confirm that the inclusive language is now present. Both sexual orientation and gender identity are explicitly included as protected statuses for both its Equal Employment Opportunity Policy and Harassment in the Workplace Policy.

An ExxonMobil spokesperson confirmed to ThinkProgress that the policies had been updated, adding, “ExxonMobil’s policies prohibit all forms of discrimination in any company workplace, anywhere in the world. ExxonMobil supports a work environment that values diversity and inclusion, and has numerous inclusive programs and policies that help make ExxonMobil a great place to work.”

The policies indicate that they have been “modified for application in the United States.” This suggests that ExxonMobil made the change specifically because of President Obama’s executive order last summer requiring that all contractors of the federal government must have policies protecting their LGBT employees. ExxonMobil was undoubtedly the largest such contractor without a policy.

A suit accusing ExxonMobil of discriminating against gay candidates for job openings in Illinois is ongoing.

LGBT workplace protections are but one factor that the Human Rights Campaign considers on its corporate scorecard, which means ExxonMobil’s rating will not immediately be salvaged by the change.