Proposition 8 Supporters Seeking Special Rights

by Al Falafel

According to California's campaign finance law, contributors to political causes are subject to public disclosure of their names within specific time periods during every election cycle. As of this writing, the deadline for disclosures of those who contributed to the November 6, 2008 election and ballot issues is tomorrow: February 2, 2009.

Last Thursday, a ruling by US District Judge Morrison England upheld the law after attorneys for the Yes on Prop 8 Campaign filed suit to grant their supporters the special right of keeping their identities private. Many of the donors have already been named in previous filings but those who contributed in the last weeks before the ballot will, by law, be revealed tomorrow.

It is believed that a huge last-minute drive for contributions funded the onslaught of TV and internet ads in the campaign's last few weeks and that most of that money came from out of state. The Yes on 8 officials indicate that up to 16,000 names of late supporters are on the list they been have trying to suppress. They still may file for an injunction to prevent the release of this lawful information as they appeal the ruling that upheld the law.

The basis of their request for such special, unprecedented exemption to long-standing campaign finance laws is a supposed widespread threat of retribution toward their donors by citizens who have had their legitimate marriages dissolved against their will a result of the passage of Proposition 8. There have been reports of calls for boycotts of organizations who gave money to ruin these people's lives and some of those affected by the new law have apparently taken it upon themselves to express their outrage at some of those donors by leaving emotional messages on the answering machines of some whose names have already been revealed.



No acts or even real threats of violence have been credibly reported. Yet they are pushing the idea that harassing calls could lead to violent attacks - like those that have been waged against family planning clinics including the murders of doctors who perform abortions (just check Wikipedia's entry on abortion-related violence).

Of course they are afraid of such escalation of violence from those who emotionally disagree with them in political and social matters - but only because that's what THEY would be likely to do.

Their fears are unfounded, however, because WE on the opposite side of the marriage issue ARE NOT LIKE THEM. We do not resort to violence and the mere suggestion that those who gave money to deny same-sex couples the basic right to their marriages need to be protected is pure poppycock. They are not political dummies - they knew what they were doing. They strategically held off contributing to the cause until the last minute - knowing their names would later be released - but they figured that no one would care once the deal was done.

Who woulda thunk that people do care and are not going to roll over and accept the outcome of a vote that reduced them to second-class citizens (at best) without a fuss?!

So, as part and parcel of their strategy we are hearing wildly imaginative scenarios, equating gay people with terrorists, in order to intimidate those who only seek to return the favor in some legal, nonviolent way such as a boycott against their funders - perhaps something like the one waged for years now by the organization "Life Decisions International."

This group keeps an updated list of businesses and organizations that support Planned Parenthood International, providing names, home addresses and phone numbers of the owners of businesses - many of them small, family-owned small businesses. Their aim is to encourage their followers to boycott, picket, harass and intimidate the people involved in these businesses and groups until they commit to denouncing Planned Parenthood and stop providing them support. You can check out their list of targets in your area by visiting www.fightpp.org.