Exposing the lies of the anti-equality side

Right on schedule, the fear-mongering ads are being run in Maine, Maryland, Minnesota and Washington.

You know the ones, about how horrible homos will sue anyone who disagrees with them, ruin hardworking people's businesses,  or force churches to marry goats.  Or something.

This article from Portland, ME the exposes the strategy.  Go!  Read!  Share!

Frank Schubert likes to tell stories.

Really, really short stories. 

Stories so short they can scare the bejesus out of you before you even know what they're actually about. 

Schubert, you'll recall, is the California schemer who choreographed the repeal of Maine's same-sex marriage statute in 2009. Now he's back, leading the National Organization for Marriage's offensive against same-sex marriage in referendum campaigns in Maine, Maryland, Minnesota and Washington. 

Schubert's strategy of choice? Take a complicated story and, in 30 seconds or less, reduce it to televised graffiti.... 

Now I'll be the first to admit there are plenty of things to lie awake worrying about between now and Nov. 6. But an ongoing employer-employee spat that happened in another country? 

Hey, like all the others crafted to inflame rather than inform, that's Frank Schubert's kind of story. 

So short on facts it's scary.

What? Marriage equality opponents are lying?

No, really?  They wouldn't do that, would they?

From the Bangor Daily News (ME):

Opponents of same-sex marriage in Maine are mischaracterizing the reasons that Catholic Charities of Boston stopped brokering adoptions in 2006, according to Peter Meade, the organization’s former board chairman, who spoke with reporters in Maine on Wednesday. 

[S]upporters of a group called Protect Marriage Maine have alleged that among the consequences of granting same-sex marriage in Massachusetts, Catholic Charities was forced to stop performing adoptions after Vatican officials learned that at least 13 children had been placed with same-sex couples. 

....Meade said the situation that unfolded in Boston was driven by 1989 anti-discrimination laws that were on the books for more than a decade before same-sex marriage was legalized in the Bay State in 2004.
....
Catholic Charities of Boston formerly held a state-issued contract funded by taxpayer dollars to provide adoption services, and placed 13 children with same-sex couples between 1989 and 2006. The work was done in accordance with a Massachusetts anti-discrimination law that requires taxpayer-funded services to be provided equitably and without regard to sexual orientation, among other things. 

Meade said that the Vatican demanded in 2006 that Catholic Charities end its adoption service, despite a unanimous vote by the charity’s local board to continue adoptions. 

“Frankly, the only criteria for us was what was in the best interest of the child and we thought the Vatican was changing that,” said Meade. “People are suggesting in the campaign that it had something to do with the [same-sex marriage law] that allowed for marriage equality. That’s not correct.”

In the states

The Box Turtle Bulletin has a great overview of the four states that are facing votes on equality this season. We have a good chance in WA, and maybe ME, but the others are going to be much closer. If you can help-- if you live there, or know people who live there, be an advocate for equality. Click on the images below to go to the campaigns for ME, MD, MN, or WA.

Will you answer the call? (video Sunday)

Mainers for marriage.  They are going back to the ballot to defeat their version of Prop 8.

Lots of activity in the individual states.

Here's a great summary by AP about all the activity in the states this year over marriage equality.  In brief:

MN and NC citizens will vote on amendments to ban marriage between same sex couples, while

ME will try to get the voters to support marriage in a referendum.

MD , WA and NJ have legislative efforts to legalize marriage between same sex couples, while

NH has a legislative effort to repeal marriage equality

In the judicial sphere, we're still waiting for the next chapter of the Prop8 case. At least 8 DOMA cases are winding their way through the courts.

How to talk to your family this holiday about marriage equality (video Sunday)

From EqualityMaine:

New Ads from Maine (video Sunday)

You may recall that Maine's marriage equality law got Prop8'd, before anyone actually got married. The bad guys used the same exact tactics as Prop8 in CA and it worked. But Maine is trying to reverse this bias and bigotry. Here's one of the new ads they're running. What do you think?

How do they do it? The roadmap of the anti-equality forces

Writing over at Pam's House Blend, Alvin McEwan lays out the roadmap used by the anti-equality forces over, and over, and over again.  A must-read.

The North Carolina Legislature has passed a bill to allow its citizens to vote on a state constitutional amendment against gay marriage.

The majority of folks in NC are against this amendment but that is considered a minor detail by the organizations and people pushing it. ...

The untold narrative usually goes like this:

People in the targeted states are so generally worried about more pressing issues that they allow their legislatures to be the first salvo in what can be called an invasion, i.e. laying the groundwork by passing a bill, thereby forcing constituents to vote on the matter.

Then an organization – usually the National Organization for Marriage – is the second part of the invasion via its virtually unlimited funds supplied by secret donors (which the group has fought tooth and nail not to reveal), that pays for the inundation of robocalls, mailers, and commercials spinning a multitude of lies about gays harming children or gays persecuting Christians, or gays causing all sorts of mayhem in general if the amendment is not passed.

At the same time, the organization stroke the egos of area pastors and public leaders....

The organization – again usually NOM – wins the vote and while it brays about how “the community stood up to protect marriage,” the community in actuality deals with strife, hard feelings, broken families, and generally not understanding why their votes to “protect marriage” hasn’t put food on their tables, more money in their paychecks, or made their lives better.

All of this is documented from all the past battles: Prop8 (CA), Question 1 (ME), etc etc. Now we have Amendment 1 (NC), as well as the vote in Minnesota. The lies begin. The hate. The families and friends divided. We still haven't recovered in California. The damage was huge. That's what MN and NC face next. Sadly, that will be true regardless of the outcome--becuase the damage is done not just by the vote, but by the campaign.

Back to the ballot in Maine?

Last year, in a heartbreaker, a referendum on Marriage Equality (Question 1) in Maine overturned the legislature's bill that provided for marriage equality, and enshrined discrimination, using the same vicious lies that worked in CA. But now, emboldened by New York, Equality Maine is thinking of going back to the ballot.

Today, EqualityMaine will launch a campaign to gather signatures to place marriage equality on the ballot in November 2012.

They will face much work and a long campaign to legalize same-sex marriage here....

As a new campaign begins, we can expect to see a well-funded and committed opposition, determined to repeat their success of the past.

And we can expect to hear the same sort of lies and distortions about same-sex marriage that were peddled before.

But I am hopeful that this time, Mainers will make a different choice and that they will hear the stories of their neighbors and realize that discrimination is wrong no matter how it is rationalized.

Question 1: The Documentary (video Sunday)

This great Documentary reviews the battle for marriage equality in Maine. Mark Mutty, the advocate against equality, is worried that this is how he'll be remembered. Uh, yes, Mark, good chance. Sleep well? I hope not.

Post Mortem on Question 1

From the Huffington Post, No on One campaign director Jesse Connolly.

This was a very painful loss. The simple fact is that their margins were wider in the places they needed to win, and our winning margins were either smaller than we projected, or we lost bigger in places where we needed to keep it much closer. Clearly, there is town-by-town, city-by-city analysis we need to do and much of that is already underway.

Nonetheless, permit me to make a few observations.

First and foremost, marriage equality is a complex issue. Many people are conflicted and we know from national and state specific polling that it is very difficult to move people on this issue, particularly in the confines of short campaigns.

Secondly, our opponents capitalized on that conflict by constant distortion and misrepresentation. It reminds me of the movie, Supersize Me: why order a midsize coke when you can have a giant coke? Their bar is much lower than ours. They only have to plant and feed the doubt. And it is difficult to fully restore any reputation, be it an issue or character, that's plagued by constant doubt.

Remember, this was a campaign where we got up on the air first and where we put genuine Maine values as the context for supporting marriage equality. .....

But here's where it gets tricky and here's where we need some answers over the next several weeks or months. It's clear that polling research, both ours and others, did not capture the intensity of Yes on 1 support. Polling cannot predict turnout and the impact of Tuesday's turnout was counterintuitive. We weren't alone: our opponents, political observers and field operatives all believed a high turnout benefited the NO on 1 vote. With voting approaching 60% in Maine, it's clear that wasn't true.
....

It may turn out to be simply this: that by moving this basic premise of equality from the sink hole of catastrophic defeat state after state, year after year, to within striking distance of a win, that we are almost to the finish line. This tide is turning and you can tell by the histrionics from our opponents, from their "gathering storm."

It appears that the Bradley effect is alive and well: that is, polling on this subject routinely understates the opposition to equality. Well, at least they are ashamed to tell the pollsters that they hate us. I suppose that's progress of a sort.

Dear Maine, 2

Dear Maine,
You can't say I didn't warn you, back in May, what to expect if you put the rights of your GLBT citizens to the popular vote.

The lies, the ignorance, and the divisiveness happened just as I predicted. The haters told vicious lies, and they won.

I know just how your GLBT citizens, their friends, and their families feel this morning. Because we still feel that way.

And as I told you before, you have deeply injured your community. People don't just "get over" being told they are second class, that their families are not worth protecting and that their love is meaningless. People don't just move on from the insults and the bile. Now, every interaction is tinged with doubt: did this person vote against me? Does this person hate me?

Workplaces will be on edge. Civic interactions will suffer. Churches will be split. There will be deep, deep hurt.

Maine, you have torn the heart out of many people. And that damage will linger for a long, long time.

I'm so sorry you did this. But you can't say you didn't see it coming.

Sadly,
California.

From Wockner: "Gay marriage was a winner in the cities of Portland (73%), South Portland (64%) and Bangor (54%), and in places such as Kennebunkport (61%) and Bar Harbor (73%). It lost in the cities of Lewiston (40%) and Augusta (47%)."

We lost, again

48% of Maine voters believe in fairness and equality. 52% believe in ignorance and bigotry.

We've seen this before. As shown by Gallup, not until 1991 did a plurality of Americans approve of inter-racial marriages. Indeed, one might argue that the landmark Loving v. Virginia Supreme Court decision of 1968 sped it up, and even then, the electorate only caught up with the law 30 years later.

So I should wait 30 years? Demographics suggest in 30 years I have a reasonable chance of being dead. In the meantime I remain a very angry, frustrated, second class semi-citizen.

David Mixner speaks out

Read the whole thing.

Tonight once again we will be forced to sit on the edge of our seats as the voters of Maine get to chose whether we get to be a free people in their state. The concept that a majority of voters in any state can decide if I shall have the same rights of all Americans is repugnant to me. We won't know the results until late in the evening, but there is one result that is overwhelmingly clear to LGBT citizens and their allies: President Obama and his team were zero help in this critical battle and in the last week might actually have hurt us. That is a fact.

Despite repeated pleas for assistance from this community from the start of the campaign, he chose to ignore every opportunity to grant us such relief. At the recent Human Rights Campaign dinner he never said the word "Maine" once. The most we were able to get out of the White House office of communications was that he was opposed to such efforts. Try weaving that into a powerful ad or robo-calling!

However, practicing benign neglect was not the end of it. This past week, Eric Holder, the Attorney General of the United States in the state of Maine said that this administration had no position on the ballot measure. Read that sentence again carefully. Our nation's chief law enforcement officer and the president's hand picked choice said that the issue was just not that important to this administration! Now don't be fooled by any rhetoric that presidents don't take stands on such issues. Going back as far as President Carter when he opposed Proposition Six, they have taken such stands.

The fierce advocate of whenever and the DNC have pedalled as fast as they can away from GLBT rights. But you know what? Just as in the public option in health care, the American public is much smarter than they think. Real life is not limited by an inside-the-beltway news focus. We know that Obama is ditching GLBT rights. The battle is up to us at the local level. And my wallet, I'm afraid, is going to be directed to fund those fighting local battles for us, battles that make a difference to our lives, rather than high-falutin' flowery speeches that blow away in the wind. Words are cheap.

Meanwhile, Maine turnout is bigger than expected....

Awesome Op/Ed from Maine

Read the whole thing:

While this change in the law could seem abrupt to some Maine voters, it reflects the way people are really living now in cities and towns all over our state. That's why we urge people to vote "no," to allow this reasonable law to go into effect.

..... Limiting marriage to a man and a woman would not make families led by same-sex couples go away. It would just keep them in a legally inferior position that is inconsistent with Maine's tradition of equal protection under the law.

Gay men and women already live together, own property and have children, both biological and adopted. They hold responsible jobs, they volunteer in churches and schools -- they are full members of our communities. The only thing they cannot do is form the legal partnership that gives them the advantages and duties that other couples have when they start families. The same-sex couples are not the only losers. This also puts their children at a disadvantage.

.... A "yes" vote won't make those couples go away. It would only make their lives more difficult.

..... There is virtually no way to surgically carve out and tie together all the rights and responsibilities of marriage in a legal relationship that does what marriage does without calling it marriage......

Families led by same-sex partners are here now. They are part of our communities and they need and deserve the legal protections -- as well as the dignity -- that comes with civil marriage status.

Maine voters should recognize that even if their personal beliefs about marriage haven't changed, reality has. They should accept reality and vote "no" on Question 1.

Hat tip Susan Russell

Leader of anti-equality campaign in Maine admits lying

It's not about the children. It never was. They are LYING and they even admit they are LYING.

In an interview tonight on Maine Public Broadcasting Network, Mutty not only admitted that, contrary to what his campaign has been alleging, there won't be a mandate to teach same-sex marriage in schools, he went further. Mutty admitted that his side has misled the people of Maine:

"We've never said that schools will be mandated- or, actually, perhaps we did in one ad, or certainly led people to believe that, inadvertently," says Yes on 1's Chairman Marc Mutty.

"Inadvertently." Wink, wink.

The election is close and it's all up to GOTV. Can you help? If you are anywhere in New England, can you get to Maine? If you are anywhere else, can you donate for the last ad buy, or make calls?

This is not about saving families, religious rights, or children. It's about bigotry pure and simple and that's ALL it's about.

Maine: the final ad

Do all Maine children deserve equal protections, or not? Vote No on one.

Truth and Hope: another ad from Maine (Video Sunday)

Marriage in Maine, and elsewhere

A moving Op/Ed

Love, monogamy, commitment, integrity and morality are family values offered by the No on 1 campaign. To be around any couple (gay, straight, or lesbian) who advocates for loving, life-long, married commitment, can only enhance my life, my 20-year marriage, and our daughters' lives.

It is a privilege for me and my family to know other couples (gay, straight, or lesbian) who are committed to married life and who raise their children with integrity, love and compassion. I encourage all Mainers to have a tender heart toward gay and lesbian neighbors.

The bottom line is: No on 1 is advocating for committed marriages as a means to express the depth of loving relationships, and that is a beautiful and worthy aspiration for all human beings.

The writer, a faithful Catholic, has been removed from her role as a Eucharistic minister for daring to support civil (NOT religious) marriage equality. And meanwhile the Diocese of Maine is closing even more churches, as it donates money and lies to the anti-equality campaign.

"Why did I fight in Normandy?"

TEstimony from Maine, an 86 year old veteren.
Q: Do you believe in equality for GLBT people?
A: What do you think I fought for on Omaha Beach?

My wife and I did not raise four sons with the idea that three of them would have a certain set of rights, but our gay child would be left out. We raised them all to be hard-working, proud, and loyal Americans and they all did good. I think it's too bad [inaudible] want to get married, they should be able to. Everybody's supposed to be equal in equality in this country. Let gay people have the right to marry. Thank you.