Just in. Yet another in the recent string of victories for (real) conservative values and the U.S. Constitution…
U.S. District Court Judge Virginia Phillips’ landmark ruling was widely cheered by gay rights organizations that credited her with getting accomplished what President Obama and Washington politics could not.
U.S. Department of Justice attorneys have 60 days to appeal. Legal experts say they are under no legal obligation to do so and could let Phillips’ ruling stand.
More details in the full AP story.
The order follows a successful lawsuit by the Log Cabin Republicans in which Judge Phillips found the military’s policy — which President Obama has chosen not to end with an executive order as he could have — to be unconstitutional on First Amendment free speech grounds and a violation of the due process rights of gay and lesbian service members.
The decision also follows a string of other recent victories in federal courts for real conservative values, as confirmed by Republican-appointed judges, such as the U.S. District Court judge’s finding this past August that California’s Prop 8 ban on same-sex marriage violates the U.S. Constitution’s Equal Protection clause.
As we noted recently, while it often takes far too long in this nation, the good news is that, eventually, Constitutional rights win and the haters lose. Today’s ruling underscores that hopeful point — in an otherwise dark period in this nation’s history — once again.
UPDATE 4:08pm PT: 21 Democratic U.S. Senators have sent a letter to the Obama Administration asking them to not appeal Judge Phillips’ order. There are no GOP Senators signed on to the letter despite the fact that it was a GOP group who won the decision in court. While, to be fair, we also don’t know if the Dem Senators asked the Republicans to sign or not, the fact that all of them voted against a repeal of DADT (if it were to be approved by the U.S. military) in the recent Defense Authorization bill suggests that it’s likely none of the Republican Senators would have done so anyway. The letter from the Democratic Senators is now posted here….
UPDATE 10/15/10: Confusion reigns. Incredibly, the DoJ is asking the Judge to stay the order pending appeal after all. (Which part of “Unconstitutional” do you not understand, Mr. President?!) Of course, in truth, the decision is the DoJ’s, not the President’s directly. The Pentagon, earlier this week, has said for the moment they will not be enforcing DADT, though later in the week they told folks to not come out yet! Apparently. As mentioned, confusion reigns. Details on the appeal here. Memo from the Pentagon here.
You mean-you mean-we have a CONSTITUTION? And it WORKS?!
About f’ing time.
Obama finally gets something right.
Whasawhat? Who did this? Oh. Umm, okay.
Who is Br3t Kimb3rlin?
Glad to hear about this..now I’ll wait for the other shoe to drop…
> 21 Democratic U.S. Senators have sent a letter to the Obama Administration asking them to not appeal Judge Phillips’ order. There are no GOP Senators signed on to the letter despite the fact that it was a GOP group who won the decision in court.
What they are asking him to do is wholly improper. The president has a duty to protect all legislation against constitutional challenge–even the stuff he doesn’t like.
Imagine if the shoe was on the other foot. Imagine if a republican was elected in 2012 and he decided not to defend Obamacare? Or the Voting Rights Act of 1965?
This approach would give Obama effectively a veto over the laws he didn’t like. all he needed was some group to challenge its constitutionality (and there is always someone willing to do that), and the president can just decline to defend it, and bam its declared unconstitutional. A veto, with no chance of congressional override. It should not be done.
And for those saying its the constitution. Oh, please. Yeah, that is right, we have been excluding gay people from the military for over 225 years but suddenly in 2010 its unconstitutional. I sketch out my fuller views, here: http://allergic2bull.blogspot.com/2010/09/permission-to-speak-freely-or-full.html
The question is…what happens when the DoD refuses to comply?
The question is: where’s the story about absentee ballots for military and other overseas citizens which were mailed out delinquently by several counties in (surprise!) blueblueblueblue states? The ballots which are in very real danger of not being counted because of the failure to meet the deadline.
Dear WINGNUTSTEVE @comment8–Here’s the punchline from the latest from Bev Harris about vote by mail. She first gives a brief history of Jeff Dean, an ex-felon who invented the system we used.–
According to court transcripts, Jeffrey Dean admitted to remotely accessing the voter databases and vote by mail programs for California counties during live elections. So what we have (or have had) is a convicted embezzler tinkering around by remote access in the vote databases that control elections.
Sorry, typo.–meant to write–invented the system we use(not used).
I don’t get the joke David, so the punchline is meaningless.
Brad is apparently the squeakiest wheel on the subject of voting. This is a serious issue. But for several days now his “Breaking News” is a story about DADT? That’s just awesome….
Aaron Worthing said @6:
As usual, right-wing Worthing gets it wrong.
First, the decision whether to appeal a district court ruling rests with the Attorney General, not with the President.
Second, both the President and the Attorney General have taken a solemn oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States.
Where, as here, a U.S. District Court Judge has ruled a particular statute to be unconstitutional, the first duty of the Attorney General is to analyze the decision to determine whether or not the District Court’s ruling is sound. If the Attorney General determines that it is, he has to carefully decide whether an appeal is warranted.
The Attorney General is entitled to weigh the probability of success or failure of an appeal, the cost in public monies in pursuing the appeal and the public interest in deciding whether to appeal.
By the way, Aaron, where were you and your “Presidents must abide by statutes” when the Bush/Cheney cabal issued more than 1,000 Presidential signing statements which asserted the right for a President to unilaterally decide not to enforce a statute even though no court declared that statute unconstitutional?
Is there no end to hypocrisy on the Right?
WingNutSteve–
The joke is almost every aspect of our voting system including the absentee ballots you’re concerned about. If you don’t get it, you don’t get it.
Unpleasant attitude ya got there. No thanks, my quota has already been filled.
David, great attitude ya got there. The system sucks anyway so screw it.
And still the question remains, where’s the story from the squeakiest wheel on this? Blue states, with tight races, forget to send absentee ballots in time to overseas voters who likely will swing heavily Republican… how convenient.
Don’t fret Brad, the Justice Department is looking into it (lol!). Please carry on with the Ann Coulter story which is obviously much more important.
WingnutSteve @ 14 said:
You may be shocked to learn that, by and large, it is just me here covering things, Steve. Therefore, no, I’m not able to cover everything. There are many stories which similarly reflect poorly on GOP that I can’t get to either, in many cases.
As to what you refer to above, I am unaware of the charges, but you are free to offer us a link. One of the things that helps our wheels squeak here is the superb community of commenters who share information that I’m not always able to cover. You shared no such link.
Beyond that, The BRAD BLOG has, for years, been a voracious supporter of military voting rights. That’s just one of the reasons the Internet Voting scam, using our troops as guinea pigs is so appalling. Yes, they too have the right to have their vote cast privately and counted accurately and transparently. That the DoD has seen fit to give away that right to privacy and accuracy and transparency — even as both vets and active duty military have for many years been disenfranchised in many way — is disgusting, and something that we’ve gone to great lengths over the years to take on.
Your implications, aside from being inaccurate, are offensive.
Don’t fret Brad, the Justice Department is looking into it (lol!). Please carry on with the Ann Coulter story which is obviously much more important.
http://www.newsroomamerica.com/story/65122/justice_dept._investigating_il_over_military_ballots.html
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/2010-10-15-1Atroopvote15_ST_N.htm
http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news/local&id=7725477
WingnutSteve @14–
Not sure if when you say–The system sucks anyway so screw it.– you are mistakenly attributing that sentiment to me as if it’s one I hold, or simply making a declarative statement of your own feelings.
Just in case you mistakenly think that is my point of view, it’s not. I’m for fixing the sucky system. I was just trying to point out to you that whatever is going on with the absentee ballots you’re referring to, according to the latest from Bev Harris there well may be serious problems with any vote by mail efforts.
As part of my effort to effect the desperately needed change to our current voting dysfunction, I wanted to bring this new info to your attention as I’m convinced a big part of our continuing voting clusterfuckedupedness is a simple lack of information.
http://www.blackboxvoting.org/
Problems with vote by mail currently lead info at Bev’s site. The story of Jeffrey Dean creating our vote by mail system can be found with a little scroll down(at the moment).
This decision must get to the SCOTUS, to fail to do s will allow the issue to be re-litigated. This isn’t a policy of the DoD, it’s law passed by Congress. Nothing short of a SCOTUS decision will kill the law or, unfortunately legitimize it. I think SCOTUS will dither until the DOD survey/report is in and hope that Congress will do the right thing and strike down the law.
I think SCOTUS is so polarized and morally corrupt they may well uphold DADT. I also think the Senate is so corrupt it might not strike down DADT no matter what DoD’s survey/report says. It’s a bit*ch being a cynic and a politics watcher.