Ruth Ann Dailey On DOMA

Ruth Ann Dailey's wrote her own dissent of US v Windsor a few days ago in the Post-Gazette.

I gotta say that I've met Ruth Ann a few times (we shared the table on "Night Talk: Get To The Point" a few months ago) and she's a very nice person.  She's not stupid or hateful at all - and as a person I'd like to say that I like her very much.

But she's completely wrong about her dissent in the P-G where she seems to be saying that it's just so darned unfair to "religious traditionalists" for the big bad guv'ment to treat everyone fairly.  But don't take my word on it.  Here's what she says:

The only matter settled by the U.S. Supreme Court's decisions on gay marriage last week is that our nation faces many more years of litigation and legislation. And that was already a certainty before the decision was handed down.

Had the court established a sweeping constitutional right to same-sex marriage -- a decree that, like Roe v. Wade, would have overturned the varying laws of many states -- the political climate ahead would be far more bitter and divided.

For those of us still hoping for a win-win, this bit of judicial restraint constitutes some good news.

The bad news is that while the majority decisions were restrained, their rhetoric was not. The prevailing justices' lack of historical knowledge and philosophical depth underscores the significant drawback to our society's health in appointing to the bench mere specialists in the law. These are very smart people with alarmingly narrow vision.

And in their narrow vision, they have set the stage for a new persecuted minority: religious traditionalists.

See?  By making things more fair, The Supremes are persecuting the faithful - well some faithful, as Dailey dutifully points out that:

...several Christian denominations recognize same-sex relationships and ordain openly gay clergy.

But let's get back to her rhetorical rumba.  A line or two after the intro above, she gets a simple fact embarrassingly wrong.  Here's what she wrote:

Justice Anthony Kennedy's language in the decision overturning part of the Defense of Marriage Act is, as others have already pointed out, contemptuous of tradition and those who value it. Being able to see into other people's hearts and minds, he asserts that DOMA was motivated by a "bare congressional desire to harm a politically unpopular group."

Note that the paragraph is about Justice Kennedy's language in which he asserts something about the motivations (the "bare...desire to harm") of Congress - something she's sarcastically implying he has no reason or evidence to hold true.  It's almost as if she can see into Justice Kennedy's heart and mind and that she can simply "know" that he's making it up.

Too bad the facts get in the way of that.

Let's go and see how Justice Kennedy actually used that phrase.  He uses it twice in the Windsor decision and each time (though one summarizes the other) he's quoting a previous Supreme Court decision from 1973.  His first usage:

By seeking to injure the very class New York seeks to protect, DOMA violates basic due process and equal protection principles applicable to the Federal Government. The Constitution's guarantee of equality "must at the very least mean that a bare congressional desire to harm a politically unpopular group cannot" justify disparate treatment of that group. Department of Agriculture v. Moreno...[Italics in Original]

The fact that he was quoting from a 4 decade old decision is lost on her - what she's quoting from Kennedy was not actually his language, his assertion, is it?  He was using it to make a larger point.  A writer usually as careful as Ruth Ann Dailey should not be making such a simple mistake.  But lets get back to the larger point Kennedy was making.  Here's the passage he quotes from in the Moreno decision:

For if the constitutional conception of "equal protection of the laws" means anything, it must at the very least mean that a bare congressional desire to harm a politically unpopular group cannot constitute a legitimate governmental interest.

But of course, the question remains, does DOMA reach that standard?  Dailey's asserting that Kennedy just made it up by imposing some sort of vague imagery into the hearts and minds of Congress.  However when you look at what he actually wrote, you can see that Kennedy actually does make the case (something else lost on Dailey):

In determining whether a law is motived by an improper animus or purpose, "[d]iscriminations of an unusual character'" especially require careful consideration. DOMA cannot survive under these principles. The responsibility of the States for the regulation of domestic relations is an important indicator of the substantial societal impact the State's classifications have in the daily lives and customs of its people. DOMA's unusual deviation from the usual tradition of recognizing and accepting state definitions of marriage here operates to deprive same-sex couples of the benefits and responsibilities that come with the federal recognition of their marriages. This is strong evidence of a law having the purpose and effect of disapproval of that class. The avowed purpose and practical effect of the law here in question are to impose a disadvantage, a separate status, and so a stigma upon all who enter into same-sex marriages made lawful by the unquestioned authority of the States.

It's all there, Ruth Ann.  Your sarcasm is misplaced.  You either knew it was there or you didn't.  If you knew, then you were omitting it from your column dishonestly OR if you didn't then you didn't do your homework well enough.

Which one is it?

In effect, Kennedy's saying that some states recognized that same-sex couples had the same rights as heterosexual couples but that under DOMA, the former were denied Federal rights because of who they were - if equal protection under the laws means anything it means that no law so singling out a group or class of people for harm can survive constitutional scrutiny.

But to Ruth Ann Dailey, the religious traditionalists should be free to be unfair, to treat some of their fellow citizens unequally, as second class citizens.  But then she writes this:

Quite a few of us who identify as heterosexual, Evangelical and traditionalist nonetheless wish to extend to our fellow citizens all the relationship rights we enjoy in our straight marriages. We simply wish to do so in a way that preserves our constitutional right to disagree about the theology of marriage without being persecuted by the state.

Huh?  But if same sex couples were extended all the same rights then there would not be a need for any of this would there?  And doesn't the First Amendment already protect the constitutional right to disagree on theology?  What's not protected is acting on such a disagreement so as to deny another citizen his or her basic constitutional rights.

Equal protection under the law - it's only fair.  If religion gets in the way it's the religion that's wrong not the law.

THE IRS SCANDAL!!

Hey, remember when the P-G's Jack Kelly wrote this?

Who in Washington ordered special scrutiny of Tea Party groups, pro-Life groups, pro-Israel groups and donors to Freedom Watch, an organization which supported the Iraq troop surge?

Lois Lerner, director of the Exempt Organizations Division in Washington, was placed on administrative leave (with full pay) after she invoked her Fifth Amendment right against self incrimination rather than answer questions from the House Oversight Committee. But it's doubtful the buck stops with her. [Emphases added.]

Or this?

The Internal Revenue Service demanded of some conservative groups (but not liberal groups) applying for tax-exempt status the names and addresses of their members and donors, and their contacts with journalists and legislators.

"Please detail the content of the members of your organizations' prayers," the IRS asked a pro-life group in Iowa.

Tax collectors have no right to demand such information from Americans. We must find out who is responsible for targeting critics of the Obama administration, and hold them accountable.[Emphases added.]

And how about our friends on Scaife's braintrust? Remember when they wrote this?

This is government thuggery at among its worst — siccing the tax man on those with political views opposite of those in charge of the executive branch and in the middle of a presidential election year. [Emphasis added.]

Or this?

Not only did the Internal Revenue Service target conservative groups for harassing and illegal scrutiny of their tax-exempt status, it appears to have lied about how far up the food chain knowledge of this thuggish practice went. [Emphasis added.]

And when Ruth Ann Dailey wrote this?

The cacophony has grown louder and wilder in recent days due to a quick succession of executive branch debacles: the cynical cover-up of the Benghazi assault; the IRS oppression of conservative and independent nonprofits...[Emphasis added.]

Or this?

The bolder and more troubling intrusion is the Internal Revenue Service's clearly ideological targeting of conservative and libertarian groups. Bureaucrats grilled nonprofit applicants on matters of conscience up to and including the specific content and wording of their prayers. [Emphasis added.]

Remember all this?  It was only in the last coupla months.

Now take a look at this from the New York Times:

The instructions that Internal Revenue Service officials used to look for applicants seeking tax-exempt status with “Tea Party” and “Patriots” in their titles also included groups whose names included the words “Progressive” and “Occupy,” according to I.R.S. documents released Monday.

The documents appeared to back up contentions by I.R.S. officials and some Democrats that the agency did not intend to single out conservative groups for special scrutiny. Instead, the documents say, officials were trying to use “key word” shortcuts to find overtly political organizations — both liberal and conservative — that were after tax favors by saying they were social welfare organizations.

The Times has an example:

“Common thread is the word ‘progressive,’ ” a lookout list instructs. “Activities appear to lean toward a new political party. Activities are partisan and appear as anti-Republican.”

Now that it looks like Obama Administration (or at least the IRS) was not (repeat: NOT) targeting conservative groups with their offensive and intrusive inquiries - they were targeting groups across the political spectrum - will we see a clarification from Jack Kelly?  The Braintrust?  Ruth Ann Dailey?

And what would these clarifications look like?  And how long will it take?

There are reputations at stake here.

Fact-Checking Ruth Ann...And Her Tweets

In what I suppose is supposed to be a humorous satire on our twitter-infested political conversation, my friend and P-G columnist Ruth Ann Dailey makes a few, shall we say, mistakes of a factual nature.

Take a look:

The Benghazi story broke out of its Fox News ghetto last week as mainstream media biggies decided, months after it was fairly obvious, that the Obama administration had lied -- lied! -- about the tragic event.

Newly released emails show that White House and State Department officials extensively edited the "talking points" (TPs) provided to Congress and to U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice, insisting on removing from the CIA's original memo any reference to al-Qaida, its affiliates and previous attacks on "foreign interests" in Benghazi. Apparently, renewed terrorist attacks might not have gone over very well during the presidential campaign.

But, as Tommy Vietor, a former National Security Council spokesman, tweeted Friday: "The #Benghazi TPs were written at request of the House intel committee Rs so they could go on TV. Cong forced admin to do them now attack."

You follow? "By requesting information on the murders of four Americans, Republicans ("Rs") forced us to invent things to cover our political backsides! Then these snakes object to our lies!"

Let's start at Ruth Ann's first paragraph.  In this column, as you can see, she's talking about those talking points and how the White House "lied" with them.

But we can look back as far as late November, 2012 to see that this is simply untrue:

CBS News has learned that the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) cut specific references to "al Qaeda" and "terrorism" from the unclassified talking points given to Ambassador Susan Rice on the Benghazi consulate attack - with the agreement of the CIA and FBI. The White House or State Department did not make those changes. [Emphasis added.]

There has been considerable discussion about who made the changes to the talking points that Rice stuck to in her television appearances on Sept. 16 (video), five days after the attack that killed American Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens, and three other U.S. nationals.

Republicans have accused her of making misleading statements by referring to the assault as a "spontaneous" demonstration by extremists. Some have suggested she used the terminology she did for political reasons.

And about those changes - specifically about the removal of any reference to any specific terror organizations - we can turn to the reporting of a few days earlier:

David H. Petreus, the former director of the Central Intelligence Agency, told lawmakers on Friday that classified intelligence reports revealed that the deadly assault on the American diplomatic mission in Libya was a terrorist attack, but that the administration refrained from saying it suspected that the perpetrators of the attack were Al Qaeda affiliates and sympathizers to avoid tipping off the groups.

Mr. Petraeus, who resigned last week after admitting to an extramarital affair, said the names of groups suspected in the attack — including Al Qaeda’s franchise in North Africa and a local Libyan group, Ansar al-Shariah — were removed from the public explanation of the attack immediately after the assault to avoiding alerting the militants that American intelligence and law enforcement agencies were tracking them, lawmakers said.

A few paragraphs later:

The talking points initially drafted by the C.I.A. attributed the attack to fighters with Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, the organization’s North Africa franchise, and Ansar al-Shariah, a Libyan group, some of whose members have Al Qaeda ties.

Mr. Petraeus and other top C.I.A. officials signed off on the draft and then circulated it to other intelligence agencies, as well as the State Department and National Security Council.

At some point in the process — Mr. Petraeus told lawmakers he was not sure where — objections were raised to naming the groups, and the less specific word “extremists” was substituted.

But why?

Some intelligence analysts worried, for instance, that identifying the groups could reveal that American spy services were eavesdropping on the militants — a fact most insurgents are already aware of. Justice Department lawyers expressed concern about jeopardizing the F.B.I.’s criminal inquiry in the attacks. Other officials voiced concern that making the names public, at least right away, would create a circular reporting loop and hamper efforts to trail the militants.

Again this is all from last November.  So Ruth Ann, tell me again about the lies?

Especially in light of this 2008 report from CNN:

President Bush and his top aides publicly made 935 false statements about the security risk posed by Iraq in the two years following September 11, 2001, according to a study released Tuesday by two nonprofit journalism groups.

"In short, the Bush administration led the nation to war on the basis of erroneous information that it methodically propagated and that culminated in military action against Iraq on March 19, 2003," reads an overview of the examination, conducted by the Center for Public Integrity and its affiliated group, the Fund for Independence in Journalism.

According to the study, Bush and seven top officials -- including Vice President Dick Cheney, former Secretary of State Colin Powell and then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice -- made 935 false statements about Iraq during those two years.

For instance, the Center for Public Integrity wrote:

In his State of the Union address on January 28, 2003, President Bush said: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."

But as early as March 2002, there was uncertainty within the intelligence community regarding the sale of uranium to Iraq. That month, the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research published an intelligence assessment titled, "Niger: Sale of Uranium to Iraq Is Unlikely." In July 2002, the Energy Department concluded that there was "no information indicating that any of the uranium shipments arrived in Iraq" and suggested that the "amount of uranium specified far exceeds what Iraq would need even for a robust nuclear weapons program." In August 2002, the Central Intelligence Agency made no mention of the Iraq-Niger connection in a paper on Iraq's WMD capabilities.

Just two weeks before the president's speech, an analyst with the Bureau of Intelligence and Research had sent an e-mail to several other analysts describing why he believed "the uranium purchase agreement probably is a hoax." And in 2006 the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence concluded: "Postwar findings do not support the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) assessment that Iraq was 'vigorously trying to procure uranium ore and yellowcake' from Africa. Postwar findings support the assessment in the NIE of the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) that claims of Iraqi pursuit of natural uranium in Africa are 'highly dubious.'"

I include this lie because back then, Ruth Ann wrote about how in "political theatre" "the truth rarely matters." Specifically about the unveiling of Valerie Plame:

It didn't matter that her husband Joe Wilson's investigation and subsequent New York Times editorial had actually bolstered the claim of British and Italian intelligence that Saddam Hussein had tried to buy uranium in Niger.

But we already know that that claim was "highly dubious" and that Joe Wilson's investigation did not "bolster" that claim anyway:

In late February 2002, I arrived in Niger's capital, Niamey, where I had been a diplomat in the mid-70's and visited as a National Security Council official in the late 90's. The city was much as I remembered it. Seasonal winds had clogged the air with dust and sand. Through the haze, I could see camel caravans crossing the Niger River (over the John F. Kennedy bridge), the setting sun behind them. Most people had wrapped scarves around their faces to protect against the grit, leaving only their eyes visible.

The next morning, I met with Ambassador Owens-Kirkpatrick at the embassy. For reasons that are understandable, the embassy staff has always kept a close eye on Niger's uranium business. I was not surprised, then, when the ambassador told me that she knew about the allegations of uranium sales to Iraq -- and that she felt she had already debunked them in her reports to Washington. Nevertheless, she and I agreed that my time would be best spent interviewing people who had been in government when the deal supposedly took place, which was before her arrival.

I spent the next eight days drinking sweet mint tea and meeting with dozens of people: current government officials, former government officials, people associated with the country's uranium business. It did not take long to conclude that it was highly doubtful that any such transaction had ever taken place.

You were saying, Ruth Ann?

Announcement

WEATHER PERMITTING
I've been invited to be on "NightTalk: Get to the Point" tonight on PCNC.

Chris Potter will be hosting and I'll be on a panel with Ruth Ann Dailey of the P-G and Ulish Carter of The New Pittsburgh Courier.

Again, weather permitting.

Now I gotta go study.