Posted by AzBlueMeanie: You can stick a fork in it, it's done. State high court rejects pension initiative appeal: The Arizona Supreme Court declined to make an expedited ruling on the Committee for Sustainable Retirement Benefits appeal to overturn an appellate court decision that booted the initiative from the November ballot. The Supreme Court said … Read more
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
Why Marriage Matters Arizona kicked off its educational campaign today in Phoenix and Tucson, with an eye towards building a broad-based coalition of faith community, business community, and nonpartisan political support for the fundamental right of freedom to marry for everyone without invidious state-sanctioned discrimination against any individual based upon his or her sex or gender. This coalition will support a ballot initiative for freedom to marry in 2016. Campaign launches to move marriage forward in Arizona:
PHOENIX AND TUCSON, Ariz. – In an effort to remove
discrimination from Arizona’s Constitution and win the freedom to marry
for all couples in the state, Equality Arizona, the American Civil
Liberties Union of Arizona, the Human Rights Campaign and Freedom to
Marry have launched a campaign called Why Marriage Matters Arizona.
Why Marriage Matters Arizona is a grassroots public
education campaign to build support for the freedom to marry in Arizona.
The campaign will open a dialogue with Arizonans about why marriage is
important to same-sex couples and their families and is consistent with
the values of liberty and freedom.
“Everyone should have the freedom to marry the person they love in
the state that they call home, and that includes same-sex couples in
Arizona,” said Rebecca Wininger, president of Equality Arizona. “The
national landscape for marriage is shifting rapidly. It’s time to get
the conversation started here in Arizona.”
by David Safier I have to admit, I was amused by the op ed in today's Star by Daniel McGroarty about the need for someone (cough, Arizona, cough) in the U.S. to mine more copper so we can repair our "copper gap." I was whisked back to one of my favorite characters from Dr. Strangelove … Read more
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
Thomas Mann and Norm Ornstein recently wrote at Salon, Brighter future for politics and policy requires a different Republican Party:
First, today’s sharply polarized and strategically focused political
parties fit poorly with a constitutional system that anticipates
collaboration as well as competition within and across separated
institutions. As we initially wrote, parliamentary-style parties in a
separation-of-powers government are a formula for willful obstruction
and policy irresolution. The continuation of divided party government
and the promiscuous use of the filibuster after the 2012 election have
largely frustrated the policy direction affirmed by majority electorates
and supported in polls of voters taken since the election.
Second,
the Republican Party continues to demonstrate that it is an insurgent
force in our politics, one that aspires to rewrite the social contract
and role of government developed and affirmed over a century by both
major political parties. The old conservative GOP has been transformed
into a party beholden to ideological zealots, one that sees little need
to balance individualism with community, freedom with equality, markets
with regulation, state with national power, or policy commitments with
respect for facts, evidence, science, and a willingness to compromise.
These
two factors—asymmetric polarization and the mismatch between our
parties and governing institutions—continue to account for the major
share of our governing problems. But the media continues, for the most
part, to miss this story.
Posted by Bob Lord If I were David Safier, the title of this post would be "Shameless Self Promotion" but my doing so would be "Shameless Plagiarism." So, last night, I did what I suspect many egotistical writers do — googled the title of my op-ed piece to see where it was picked up and, lo and … Read more