Chris Christie Has A Bargain For You LGBT

Posted on February 3, 2012 at 7:00 pm by JM Ashby

Last week Chris Christie, while arguing in favor of a public referendum on same-sex marriage, made the mistake of claiming minorities would have been better off if Civil Rights had been voted on in a public referendum.

Christie later apologized for the comparison, but today he reiterated the same argument while arguing in favor of a public referendum and against legislative action.

CHRISTIE: If the majority of the people want [same-sex marriage] prove it. Put it on the ballot, let it be voted on….I’ve told every Republican in the state legislator to vote to put it on the ballot. They need three-fifths to put it on the ballot. The Republicans have two-fifths in the legislature. So that means the Democrats only need to come up with one-fifth of the legislature…this is the bargain of your life. I’m giving you two-fifths! And the polls they show me say that if it goes on the ballot, it will lose. How much more magnanimous can I be? What else do you want me to do? Go campaign for it too? Look, I’m doing the best I can here!

Chris Christie doesn’t seem to understand that they’re called Civil Rights because it’s your fundamental right as a person. It is not something that should be voted on by the prejudiced masses.

Christie is running away from this as hard as he can because legalizing gay-marriage in his state at a time like this will effectively kill his chances of being selected as a vice presidential running-mate. That’s why he wants a public referendum on the matter. Because the “polls show [him] that if it goes on the ballot, it will lose.”

What is a matter of basic equality to you is just a political nuisance for Chris Christie, and while he would like for you to believe that he’s simply taking a principled stand on the right of the public to vote, the truth is he just wants it to go away for the sake of his own political career in Wingnut America.

I posted Mayor Cory Booker’s response to Christie’s comparison last week, but I’m going to post it again since Christie is now repeating the same argument.

Christie, and the entire Republican Party, is on the wrong side of history.

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  • Corebela

    What I’d like to know is if they can override his veto if he does.

  • muselet

    And the polls they show me say that if it goes on the ballot, it will lose.

    I wouldn’t be a bit surprised. Full civil and human rights for other people are never particularly popular.

    I doubt you’d be quite so enthusiastic about a referendum if the question were whether the jocks, the micks and the dagos—you know, your people—should be granted full human rights. Magnanimous? I don’t think you know the definition of that word, Mr. Creosote.

    In short, Governor Christie, you are (I wish I remembered who first used this term so I could credit him or her properly) an air-stealer. The best thing I can think to say about you is the same thing I said of Newt Gingrich a few days ago: when the zombie apocalypse comes, you’ll be easy to catch, so the rest of us will have time to get away.

    Arse.

    –alopecia, who apologizes for the ethnic slurs above

    • incredulous72

      Well done, Sir! Well Done!

    • ArrogantDemon

      Per Zombie Land, the fatties will be the first to go

      Time to go to the gym for more cardio

  • The_Dork_Knight

    Well said! I have never understood this position. Especially when gay conservatives espouse it. Andrew Sullivan actually appears to prefer gay rights be appointed through the legislative prossess. I dont know how we can vote on these things and call them rights. Moreover, if we can vote them in now, later I guess we can all just change our minds and vote them out. Its bizzare. We can’t vote on rights. If we can, I what the hell is a right?

    • West_of_the_Cascades

      Which part of “the New Jersey legislature is voting on a bill to provide for marriage equality” do you not understand? If a state doesn’t allow same-sex marriage, there are three ways it con change that: get a court to declare that it is, in fact, a civil right, and therefore that the state must allow it (see, e.g., Iowa, Massachusetts); have a representative legislature pass a law authorizing it (see, e.g., Vermont, New York), or put it to a statewide referendum (which hasn’t passed anywhere yet, but I expect will here in Oregon within the next five years).

      Some states have direct democracy (like referendums and ballot measures) to go along with our representative democracy (i.e. the legislature). Saying “we can’t vote on rights” is stupid — the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution was a vote on rights, as were the Civil Rights acts that Congress passed to implement it.

      Marriage equality requires a change in the law in every state where it does not currently exist. That’s the reality of the law and the system we live in. How do you think same-sex couples get to exercise their “right” to marry each other without one of the processes above? Seriously — do you not understand that without a court decision OR SOME SORT OF VOTE that same-sex couples in most states WILL NOT HAVE THE RIGHT TO MARRY? And are you saying that the only way anyone pushing for marriage equality should be by filing lawsuits? That’s absurd — we need to use either the legislative process or direct popular referendums in the states where they are available to get marriage equality recognized.

      Just saying “of course it’s a right we can’t vote on it” is ignorant of how you translate something you think is (or should be) a right into something recognized under the law.

      None of this excuses Christie’s cowardice in not signing a bill the legislature sends him adopting marriage equality, and fobbing it off to a referendum. In some states, a popular referendum authorizing marriage equality will pass (Oregon, California the next time it comes up, Washington this fall when the voters there – I predict – will uphold the marriage equality bill that will pass that state’s legislature in the next couple of weeks). But it has made me angry to hear people in New Jersey and on the intertoobs say “it’s a right we can’t vote on it” when they seem to have no idea that it may be a right, but without someone voting on it (whether it’s the people, the legislature, or the state or federal Supreme Court), it is NOT going to happen.

      Frankly I’d try all three ways of getting marriage equality into effect in as many states as possible — and once it’s fairly widely recognized, then the federal Supreme Court is more likely to recognize it is a “right” (see, for example, the decision Justice Kennedy authored in Lawrence v. Texas that relied on how many states had decriminalized sodomy).

      But it’s going to take some votes to do that.

      • The_Dork_Knight

        I think you should explore the difference between a vote as submitted by a citizen, a vote submitted by a legisltor toward the passage of a piece of legislation and a legal ruling a by a judge. If you think a legal rule is “a vote” I’d research the difference a bit before I called other people stupid. I would also suggest that you competely missed the point. There is a difference between a right and something that we all simply agree on or allow. What would stop everyone else in the county simply voting to strip first amendment free speech rights from criminals? Why can’t we stop Wiccans from openly practicing their religion or Oregonians from being able to access “the intertoobs” if we manage to convice 50 percent plus one of the voting population that these are good ideas?