Blind Prophecy

So, late last night, before his midnight deadline, Governor Huntsman vetoed HB 148. That means that Equality Utah is calling this a 100% year for the legislative session. In other words, no anti-gay message bills got signed into law, we passed our one major piece of legislation (hate crimes – two if you count Missy a.k.a. *-*-*myspecialvoice”>’s bill to allow minors to seek emancipation from their families).

For the first time in about a decade, we’ve had a year without new and interesting ways for the dipshits on the hill telling us how much they hate gay people. Or, well, they said it, but not enough of them in any way that will now become law. Since HB 148 only passed the senate 15-12, it’s unlikely that LaVar Christensen will be able to get the 20 votes needed for a veto override.

Somewhat sadly, though, Huntsman didn’t frown on the “concept” of the legislation (preventing courts from ackowledging a non-biological lesbian mother as having a legal relationship to the child she raised with her former partner), he objected to it being sloppy and having unintended consequences (jeapordizing the rights of non-adoptive stepfamilies, grandparents who have raised their grandchildren, etc.). He hinted pretty strongly that if the bill were to be presented with smarter language, he might reconsider his veto in the future. I don’t know if that’s just his way of pacifying the Eagle Forum cranks, or if he really doesn’t see anything wrong with rewriting law just to prevent the courts from ackowledging that gay people have families, too.

Anyway, it’s a good day. We discussed whether or not we should make it a Margarita Day at The Center, but since most of us have meetings and such later today, it seemed like a bad idea. Now, if someone shows up with a pitcher of Margaritas, I doubt anyone would be saying “no.” (But, really, Equality Utah deserves them more than we do).

Filed under: livejournal by Jere Keys