In the ongoing debate here in the Senate Committee on General Laws and Technology meeting over SB700, the bill that would prohibit the state from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation, Sen. Stephen Martin (R-Chesterfield) just made a couple of interesting comments.
He first spent a minute describing himself as “a good friend of Jerry Falwell,” “a friend of thirty years,” pointing out that he just talked with him and hour and a half ago. I write that here because I’ve enjoyed watching the reputations of Falwell and Robertson fall, and by writing about Martin’s professed friendship with Falwell here, I’ll be able to find documentation of that when it might be useful to somebody running against him.
The reason Martin was talking about Falwell was because Falwell has come out strongly in opposition to discrimination against gays, saying that protecting gay rights is “it’s an American value that I would think that we pretty much all agree on.” This means that Martin is basically obliged to support this bill, regardless of his personal beliefs.
He proceeded to awkwardly point out that “I’ve had a gay…boy…in my office,” but that he’d have fired the kid if “he’d brought his homosexuality into the office.”
I have to wonder what Sen. Martin believes would constitute bringing one’s homosexuality into the office. Would that mean strolling into work wearing cheekless leather hot pants, a feather boa, and sporting a gleaming freshly-shaven chest? Or would it mean mentioning a recent friendship with a really nice guy from church, and considering asking him out on a date? If the latter, I have to wonder if Sen. Martin would hold heterosexual employees to the same standard.
Wow…
You have to wonder why the “gay boy” would ever work for Sen. Martin in the first place.
Does he hate himself?
Waldo, could you please reread your post and make sure that you worded everything right? It was kinda a confusing post to read. I just want to make sure that it was the characters involved that were confusing, not the writer. ;-)
Yeah, you’re right, Hans, there was a bad pronoun situation there. :) I’ve cleaned a few of those up, and hopefully it’s more readable now.
Worth noting that the Senate commitee voted to KILL SB 700. Devolites Davis and the Democrats (except Colgan who abstained) votes yes.
Senators Stosch, Wampler, Hawkins, Martin, Ruff, Wagner, O’Brien, and Bell believe it should be legal for the GOVERNMENT of Virginia and its localities to discriminate against people purely on the basis of their sexual orientation.
Shame.
Does anyone know what the rationale for the nay votes was?
Hey, Waldo:
I saw you back there in the audience. I wondered if you were blogging what was a pretty interesting debate on SB 700.
First, Senator Colgan abstained by proxy. That means he left his proxy with the chair (Stosch) and Stosch didn’t know how he wanted to vote so he abstained him. Senator Colgan told me last night that he was for the bill and would vote for it. If he had been there, I am confident that the vote would have been 8-7 against, instead of 8-6 with one abstention.
Some of the Republicans on the committee voted no because they fear the wrath of the right in primary fights. One told me that his calls and emails were running 10 to 1 against. Some voted no because they accept the argument that sexual orientation is a behavior not deserving of protection under the law. At least one said he was voting no out of concern that the bill’s application to local government was going too far and “would be forcing the local governments to do something that they might not want to do…” One of the local government lobbyists told me that he would be tatooing that on his arm for future reference since that doesn’t usually stop the legislature from acting.
I think that Waldo would agree that you all would have paid to see the exchange between the representative of the Independent Baptists and Senator Yvonne Miller about what it means to be a Christian.
The longer the proponents talked the closer I think we got to getting the one additional R vote we needed.
Senator Lucas and Senator Locke are committed to bringing the bill back again next year…. and until it passes.
Thanks should go to the reps of VEA, VGEA and People of Faith for Equality in Virginia for their testimony in support of the bill and to the patrons for their commitment to this issue. In addition to Senator Miller, Senators Houck and Lambert also spoke forcefully for the bill’s passage.
Claire Gastanaga
I’m a little confused… Did Sen. Miller speak FOR the bill and then vote AGAINST it?
Er, sorry, I meant Sen. Martin.
I took copious notes, and then my battery on my laptop died before I could finish up a blog entry. I intend to finish it up and post it this evening.
And, seriously, the debate over religion was awesome. He was all like “the Bible opposes homosexuality,” and she was all like “the Bible supports slavery — should I be a slave?” and he was all like “oh, shit, she nailed me.” pwned
Senator Martin voted AGAINST the bill. As I interpret Waldo’s description, he was searching for any justification he could find to do so.
Its kind of nice to be proud of my State Senator for a change (Sen. Miller).