Discussion for article #227259
Judge Posner was the toast of conservatives when Reagan appointed him and considered to be an ideal SCOTUS candidate. His writing this decision is a really big deal for marriage equality advocates. His holding that gay marriage bans are "irrational"and don’t even require equal protection analysis is extraordinarily good news for equality proponents.
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Most TPM readers could write these decisions for the judges now.
I love how all the judges overturning bans have pretty much said that the proponents of the bans have failed to come up with a single rational justification in any of the cases.
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Proof again that when your only arguments are “it’s icky” and “my bible says,” you are doomed to failure at the appellate level.
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I don’t mean to rain poodie-doo on everyone’s parade, but just remember.
Conservatives don’t really care who we marry. As long as they get us to look the other way while the public sector is dismantled and sold off, workers’ protection nullified, and the middle class unceremoniously dumped into indentured servitude, they’re willing to throw us a social bone.
No pun intended. But seriously folks, now that we are well on the way to marriage equality (and about fuggin’ time), we need to bring all this enthusiasm to bear on economic equality.
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Hark! I do hear me the sweet, sweet sound of Teabagger heads, exploding with the tiniest of pops all over this land!
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defined by an immutable characteristic
Hasn’t he heard - its a choice. 
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When you’ve lost Posner, you’ve lost the war.
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> that same-sex couples and their children don’t need marriage because same-sex couples can’t produce children, intended or unintended — is so full of holes that it cannot be taken seriously."
I’m happy that every decision lately seems to include a variation of this statement. It needs to be shouted from the rooftops.
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I didn’t see Fat Tony’s name anywhere in the decision. Did they just use some legal argle-bargle?
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They never had a chance with this panel. Posner lives for cases like this. He loves attention and he wrote an opinion that screams for sound bites. Posner wrote a book quite awhile ago called Sex and Reason which was quite interesting and before its time. He clearly was not someone that was going to buy the States’ arguments which as he said could not be taken seriously.
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Posner is a really remarkable judge. For those who aren’t lawyers, the clarity and logic of his writing is simply genius.
Not only that, but the case was argued last week and he has already produced a 40-page opinion that is likely immune to review.
He’s really something.
Take a look at this, for example, from pages 6-7 of the opinion:
The difference between the approach we take in these two cases and the more conventional approach is semantic rather than substantive. The conventional approach doesn’t purport to balance the costs and benefits of the challenged discriminatory law. Instead it evaluates the importance of the state’s objective in enacting the law and the extent to which the law is suited (“tailored”) to achieving that objective. It asks whether the statute actually furthers the interest that the state asserts and whether there might be some less burdensome alternative. The analysis thus focuses not on “costs” and “benefits” as such, but on “fit.” That is why the briefs in these two cases overflow with debate over whether prohibiting same-sex marriage is “over- or underinclusive”—for example, overinclusive in ignoring the effect of the ban on the children adopted by same-sex couples, under-inclusive in extending marriage rights to other non-procreative couples. But to say that a discriminatory policy is overinclusive is to say that the policy does more harm to the members of the discriminated-against group than necessary to attain the legitimate goals of the policy, and to say that the policy is underinclusive is to say that its exclusion of other, very similar groups is indicative of arbitrariness.
That is a truly cogent analysis of a very complicated subject in language that is miraculously easy to understand.
Brilliant, that’s what he is.
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On, Wisconsin!
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How many states have had their bans overturned now compared to ones where gays still can’t marry?
I think Louisiana is the only one
Well, at least there will be a place for all the homophobes to go. I hear the food’s good.
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“The discrimination against same-sex couples is irrational, and therefore unconstitutional…”
I want this embroidered on a pillow.
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“Banns” = announcement of an engagement/marriage.
“Bans” = more than one ban.
That one will be overturned, in all likelihood.
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Posner to Louisiana Reaganite judge Martin Feldman: “Your father smelt of elderberries and I fart in your general direction.”
~ Harry R. Sohl
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He probably had this opinion half written 10 years ago. Posner has spoken about the absurdity of same sex marriage bans for ages.
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Yeah, the Louisiana ruling is just absurd. It’s just pages of right wing talking points about how if the gays marry, we’ll have cats and dogs living together and parents getting married to their kids and 27 men hitching up with 52 women. It’s legally ridiculous.
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