commentaries

here's the one and only reason -- religious beliefs should not dictate laws in a constitutional republic. anyone who believes in freedom and liberty that would then turn around and deny inalienable right to fellow tax-paying americans are bigots, plain and simple.

Exactly why there should be no amendment denying CIVIL marriage to any American. Civil marriage also probably shouldn't discriminate against polygamists, but tax and benefit structures would have to be fixed to prevent a pooling/transfer of benefits. If we really want to be a country of freedom and get out of people's lives, then this is what we should do. Leave it up to the churches as to what they want to promote/condone in their religious marriages.

THIS is (aside from separation of church/state issues) why I think the Gay community is fighting the *wrong battle!* For the government to confer tax and legal benefits upon one couple (same-sex or het) simply because they have had some holy jot mutter incantations over them, totally discriminates against single and co-habitating persons! Instead of working so very hard to buy-into this inequitable construct, the Gay community should, properly, be working to eliminate it!

Taxes are unfair no matter which way you put it.

Here's another reason...my company will not give any employees a pension because gay employees can not pass it to a partner should they die. This is not the case with legally married couples. Thir are consequences for straight couples too.

Finally we have it - the long lost list of "tax loopholes" republicans have been promising to close...!

All valid points in the article. BUT tax laws give benefits to those who have made a hopefully life-long committment, not to every couple living together. The tax code generally doesn't care if somebody is under the same roof or in another town when it comes to who can be paid for childcare. There IS a marriage penalty due to our progressive tax rates because a married couple is different than two singles. Do we WANT to change tax law to ask about bedrooms instead of marriage???

More than anything, this article points out how backward our tax codes have become. Time to update the whole mess.

This article gives some very good illustrations of how poorly thought-out the anti-gay proposal is. There's a bully mentality riding high right now. Some people are willing to damage all of society just to get a jab in on gay people.

The same people begrudge everyone else a decent benefits package at work, resent educated professionals' making a decent wage, and would rather the banking system collapse than someone get a reprieve on loans they can't repay. They can't stand the idea that somebody might get health insurance without being impoverished by it. If they hate their jobs, have rotten benefits and can't afford their homes and cars, nobody else should, either. If there's a chance somebody somewhere might get something they don't deserve, these people would rather the whole system collapse

Same-sex marriage already exists, whether it's legally recognized or not. Same-sex couples fulfill all the societal functions as opposite-sex couples, and nobody seriously disputes that. Some people don't understand the difference between civil and religious marriage, embarrassingly enough. And some people just want to spite gay people. Too bad they are so obsessed with other people's sex lives that they can't mind their own business. If there's a threat to marriage, it's all the straight people who can't stay faithful and keep getting divorced.

Huh. And here's me wanting to reject it because it's the right thing to do.