You can read the full opinion below, but to sum it up, the 9th Circuit feels that Proposition 8 violates the 14th amendment which requires equal protection under the law.

I’ve always been more than a little uncomfortable with the constitutional argument against gay marriage bans.

I think bans on gay marriage are silly, and born of certain base desires among some demographics which causes them to be unsatisfied unless they’re telling other people how to live their lives, whether it be what light bulb to use or who we can and cannot marry. That being said, the Constitution does not address marriage, thus it is a matter to be left to the states.

I understand that the 9th Circuit isn’t holding that there is a right in the constitution for homosexual marriage, but they are treading on an area of policy that (per the 10th amendment) is to be left to the states.

We allow states to decide the age at which citizens can get married. We allow states to put certain requirements on marriage licenses, such as blood testing. But now states can’t define the sort of marriages they sanction?

Either marriage is an area of policy to be left to the states, or it isn’t. Disagreement with California’s policy on gay marriage isn’t enough legal justification to vacate its laws.

I would much rather see gay marriage legalized through a vote of the people (as it has been in several states around the nation) than through a ruling of the court. One contributing factor to the stability of representative government is the feeling of satisfaction citizens have in believing that they have a hand in their own governance. Controversial issues settled through the democratic process have a tendency to become more controversial over time.

When the courts subvert the democratic process, and impose policy through fiat, the citizenry is often inspired to decades of resentment. Look no further than Roe vs Wade, which took from states the ability to settle abortion law for themselves, for evidence of that.

In 2007 Amber Lee Ettinger offered a nice distraction from the day-to-day grind of political junkies by dancing around in a bikini on YouTube declaring her love for Barack Obama. Here’s the video that made her famous:

Now, though, Ms. Ettinger is having some buyer’s remorse. She’s not sure if she’ll vote for Obama again in 2012:

Should you care what a bikini model thinks about the upcoming election? All due respect to Ms. Ettinger, but probably not. But assuming her change of heart is genuine, and not a ploy for attention, it does seem to track an ideological shift a lot of us go through.

When we’re young we’re more superficial, easily drawn in by celebrity and slick marketing. As we grow older, we mature and become much more concerned with specifics. Obama’s schtick probably appealed to a young woman like Ettinger four years ago. Now, after four years of growing up amid Obama’s failed policies, the landscape looks a little different.

Today is the final day for the petitioners circulating a referendum on the repeal of the state’s Fighting Sioux law (the referendum would reverse the legislature’s decision to repeal the law they previously passed, if that makes sense). I just talked to the organizers, who are still collecting signatures down in Bismarck, and they tell me that have collected 15,560 signatures (13,500 signatures are required).

In addition to that, they have what they described as a “stack” of submitted petitions they hadn’t counted yet, and they’re still collecting signatures and completed petitions in the Bismarck area.

The #SavetheSioux Cruiser (an RV emblazoned with the nickname and logo) is parked at the state capitol. You can sign your petitions there, or submit petitions you’ve circulated.

Organizers are also at the VFW Sports Center tonight for Bismarck/Bismarck Century hockey game. You can sign/submit there as well.

It’s important that those of you who want to sign the petition still do so, but this news all but guarantees that the Sioux referendum will be on the June ballot. What’s more, the second petition that would mandate the Sioux nickname in the state constitution, has been circulated alongside the referendum. I don’t have any sort of a count on the signatures for that petition, but it’s fair to say it’s in the same ballpark as the referendum.

Meaning the #SavetheSioux has one hell of a head start on the 26,904 signatures needed by August 8th, 2012 for inclusion on the November ballot.

Much to the chagrin of the Sioux nickname opponents, this issue will be on the ballot, and the public will almost assuredly vote in favor of the nickname.

Apparently, the plans Occupy DC are making for CPAC later this week include not just disruption (which is pretty much de rigueur for conservative events in any liberal enclave) but plans to harm some of the event’s attendees.

During a Thursday meeting at McPherson Square, until Saturday the epicenter of the protests, Occupiers brainstormed tactics for shutting down or disrupting the conference, according to a source who was present at the meeting.

The protesters suggested pulling fire alarms in the hotel where the conference will take place, screaming “fire” during conference activities, “glitter-bombing” participants, cutting electrical power, and barricading entrances to the hotel, according to the source, who requested anonymity.

“Speakers will be physically assaulted, not just verbally confronted,” the source told Scribe in an email. Two Occupiers, who the source also identified as members of the New Black Panther Party, “said they would be disappointed if they didn’t get arrested and planned to ‘make it count.’”

The source quoted another protester as saying, “Mitt [Romney] has Secret Service now, but [Newt] Gingrich and [Andrew] Breitbart don’t,” seemingly suggesting that the latter two would not be as heavily guarded.

I was at BlogCon, put on by FreedomWorks in Denver, last year when the local iteration of the “occupy” movement tried to break into our conference room. Ultimately it was little more than a lot of shouting, and some light pushing and shoving. Let’s hope nothing more serious than that happens at CPAC.

Really, though, I’m not sure why the occupiers think these tactics further their cause. People who might otherwise be sympathetic to their message are bound to be turned off by violence, and attacking a conference well-attended by bloggers and media and general is going to guarantee that there are plenty of cameras and witnesses around to document exactly what happens.

The Catholic Church has caused quite a stir of late in announcing that they have no intention of complying with a federal mandate that they provide health insurance coverage that pays for contraception, abortion-inducing drugs and other treatments/procedures they have a moral objection to.

Today Obama’s Secretary of Health, Kathleen Sebelius, argues in USA Today that the Obamacare law has broad exceptions for religious organizations:

The public health case for making sure insurance covers contraception is clear. But we also recognize that many religious organizations have deeply held beliefs opposing the use of birth control.

That’s why in the rule we put forward, we specifically carved out from the policy religious organizations that primarily employ people of their own faith. This exemption includes churches and other houses of worship, and could also include other church-affiliated organizations.

That is some carefully-worded, deceptive spin. Obamacare does have an exemption for religious organizations, but that exemption only applies if the organization in question primarily employ people of their own faith and serve people of their own faith.

In order to qualify for an exemption, Catholic hospitals and universities (as one example) would not only have to limit most of their hiring to Catholics but also turn Lutherans and Muslims and Jews away at the door (something that, at least in the case of hospitals, raises other ethical questions about emergency care and discrimination).

This means that it’s pretty much impossible for any organization to qualify for the exemption. There may as well not even be an exemption.

I’d say the folks at Reason have parodied that Clint Eastwood Super Bowl ad I was griping about yesterday, but it’s really not so much a parody as an editing to make it more factual.

Behold:

I’m still pretty disappointed that Eastwood participated in this nonsense.

Just in case you were doubting the idea that the nation’s teacher unions, and indeed public worker unions in general, were little more than subsidiaries of the national Demcorat party, consider that the nation’s larger teacher union – the American Federation of Teachers – just endorsed President Barack Obama for re-election before either party held its nominating convention.

Granted, Obama is the incumbent and nobody is challenging him for his party’s endorsement, and it wasn’t like the AFT was ever going to endorse a Republican candidate for President anyway, but you’d think they’d at least like to, you know, keep up appearances and make it look like they arrived at their decision based on something other than the party affiliation of the candidates.

It just goes to show how union politics work. Unions back Democrats who grow government, the last bastion of organized labor, and pass laws that all but force even private sector workers to pay union dues. The unions then use those dues to elect more Democrats (while the union bosses take a big slice for their efforts, naturally).

This has become an increasingly important relationship for the unions as their enrollment continues to decline. American workers are, more and more, realizing that they don’t need unions. The union demographic is aging. Union membership was 15.7 percent among workers 55 to 64 in 2011, but 4.4 percent for those 16 to 24.

So if Americans won’t choose unions, the unions will elect Democrats who will force Americans to join unions.

America, long ago, passed very strong laws limiting the ability of the federal government to deploy troops domestically. These laws, the Insurrection Act and the Posse Commitatus Act, prevent federal forces from being used domestically except in the most dire of national emergencies. Though weakened by the 2007 Defense Authorization Bill which, in the wake of President Bush being blamed for a slow response to Hurricane Katrina, watered down the justification needed for the use of federal forces domestically, these laws are still very much in effect and are some of the most important limits on federal power in federal code.

But it seems as though the feds have found a way to go around these laws. Across the nation, under the guise of national security, local local law enforcement agencies are being militarized through money made available by Congress. This leaves us with local police officers so thoroughly armed that they are almost indistinguishable, in some ways, from soldiers.

Nestled amid plains so flat the locals joke you can watch your dog run away for miles, Fargo treasures its placid lifestyle, seldom pierced by the mayhem and violence common in other urban communities. North Dakota’s largest city has averaged fewer than two homicides a year since 2005, and there’s not been a single international terrorism prosecution in the last decade.

But that hasn’t stopped authorities in Fargo and its surrounding county from going on an $8 million buying spree to arm police officers with the sort of gear once reserved only for soldiers fighting foreign wars.

Every city squad car is equipped today with a military-style assault rifle, and officers can don Kevlar helmets able to withstand incoming fire from battlefield-grade ammunition. And for that epic confrontation—if it ever occurs—officers can now summon a new $256,643 armored truck, complete with a rotating turret. For now, though, the menacing truck is used mostly for training and appearances at the annual city picnic, where it’s been parked near the children’s bounce house.

“Most people are so fascinated by it, because nothing happens here,” says Carol Archbold, a Fargo resident and criminal justice professor at North Dakota State University. “There’s no terrorism here.”

Like Fargo, thousands of other local police departments nationwide have been amassing stockpiles of military-style equipment in the name of homeland security, aided by more than $34 billion in federal grants since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, a Daily Beast investigation conducted by the Center for Investigative Reporting has found.

Not only is a waste of money to militarize law enforcement officers in relatively low-crime areas like Fargo and North Dakota in general, it’s a worrisome bit of mission creep that has our law enforcement departments becoming more and more dependent on federal money for equipment and outfitting.

Obviously, a federal grant allowing local law enforcement to buy assault rifles, tanks and…uh…snow cone machines isn’t the same thing as a federal take over of law enforcement. But it is wasteful spending at a time when our nation can ill afford it, and you really have to wonder why people think even the communities in our nation with the least amount of crime need to be patrolled by law enforcement officials armed as if they were in Baghdad instead of Fargo.

The National Journal has a post up about PAC money in the North Dakota Senate race. The article notes that Berg has raised a little bit more in money from PACs than Heitkamp. Of course, that’s only true if you don’t count Heitkam’s second campaign fund apparently created specifically to take special interest money from trial lawyers. But then, that’s one of the nice things about having two campaign fundraising committees, no? The media usually only focuses on your primary committee.

Regardless, what more interesting than the PAC money was this paragraph:

In advance of her Jan. 31 filing, the AP reported Heitkamp’s campaign, which we called a Senate fundraising “winner”, said she raised just under $500,000. But that figure was rounded pretty far above the $450,000 she actually raised.

I went back and looked at the press release put out by Heitkamp’s campaign and they reported their fundraising number more or less accurately. “North Dakota Senate candidate and former Attorney General Heidi Heitkamp announced raising $450,000 in the first weeks since announcing her campaign, from November 8, 2011 to December 31, 2011,” was the statement in the press release.

So it was apparently some reporter at the Associated Press who decided to round the campaign’s fundraising up by $50,000.

It’s bad enough that the Heitkamp campaign deliberately files their official fundraising report at the last possible moment before the deadline, and on paper as opposed to electronically to maximize the delay in the numbers being posted on the internet, but we don’t need the state’s reporters padding her numbers too.

Last election cycle backers of a measure to repeal North Dakota’s ban on chain pharmacies (limiting the choices North Dakotans can make as to which pharmacy they wish to use) saw their petitions denied due to a technicality (many of them weren’t circulated with the text of the measure attached). State political activist Duane Sand decided to take up the issue for the 2012 cycle, but then he also decided to launch yet another quixotic campaign for federal office (his fourth), and that has left many backing the pharmacy petition to feel like he’s abandoned the issue after inserting himself into a leadership role in it.

Now Sand has sent out the email below to supporters of the measure (full disclosure: I’m on the sponsoring committee) withdrawing himself from the effort. This marks yet another worthwhile effort set back because of Sand’s ambition. In the 2008 cycle, Sand (as the state director of Americans for Prosperity) was backing an initiated measure to cut state income taxes. But then, before all the signatures were collected for that measure, he again decided to launch a campaign for federal office (the US House, that time, his third campaign). The measure ultimately got the signatures it needed to make the ballot, though it was ultimately defeated by voters after a fierce campaign against it orchestrated by the Republican Governor at the time, John Hoeven (with an assist from the state’s union and government lobbyist interests).

Sand is one of the most energetic advocates for conservatism in North Dakota, and if he could ever manage to get out of his own way, he could be one of its most effective as well. Voters might have taken his campaigns for public office more seriously had he taken the time to finish one of these grassroots efforts he starts before beginning his campaign.

As many of you know, I have long been a proponent of repealing North Dakota’s antiquated pharmacy ownership law.

It is a misguided protectionist law that costs consumers money on their prescriptions every day that it remains on the books, especially senior citizens on fixed incomes. Beyond that, it is contrary to the free market principles that a consistent conservative must support to remain credible.

The moral support I have received for efforts in repealing this law has been outstanding. But moral support alone cannot win elections, or repeal bad laws.

It has recently been brought to my attention that some of the big name supporters of the effort to repeal North Dakota’s pharmacy ownership law are reluctant to offer their full support, not because they have changed their minds, but because of completely unrelated public policy disagreements.

To be blunt, these disagreements are locking out the kind of financial resources needed to get this measure passed once it’s on the ballot.

As such, I am announcing the end of my role in the effort to repeal the pharmacy ownership law in North Dakota. Repealing the law is far more important to the people of North Dakota than is the credit that would come with leading the cause. Good public policy should come before worrying who gets credit, but sometimes Real Leadership means stepping down when it is best for the mission.

I would like to thank those that are working hard to get this measure on the ballot, and urge you not to be discouraged because of political personality conflicts that may be involved in the process.

Good public policy can and does get messy.

Yours in Liberty,

Duane A. Sand