prop 8

so it appears that the california supreme court will rule today on the validity of proposition 8, which banned gay marriage in california

and as someone who is a proponent of gay marriage, the case nonetheless represents an interesting gray area; as im not sure there is a strong case for overturning it since it was a statewide proposition. its one of those interesting cases in which you have a position (for gay marriage) but not sure whether the case itself has any legal grounding.

i guess the question would have to be the intricacies of the california legal system, which i am not familiar with. it seems to me that the original supreme court case which ruled gay marriage was legal was an interpretation of the state constitution; and for that to be overturned it would have to be done so via a constitutional amendment, not a voter proposition (in MA when gay marraige was ruled legal, the opposition went straight for a constituional amendment). But that seems a bit too easy so who knows. from what I read it looks like the supreme court isnt likely to overturn the proposition.

the silver lining if that happens is that, according to a recent study, Massachusetts has benefited enormously over the last five years (since gay marriage was rule legal) as huge swaths of what they call the "creative class" have flocked to the bay state and contributed substantially to our economy and culture. California might siphon that off from us and we dont want that.