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very good news out of Arizona Arizona Republican Governor Jan Brewer
has vetoed the anti-gay SB
1062 bill that's been the center of a lot of controversy this is one of these
bills
that is falling under the loose umbrella a very religious freedom bill
which of course once the bill is drafted
proponents say has nothing at all to do with anti-gay motivations however this
is patently false oh let's get that out of the way first
then I'll tell you more about jan Brewer proponents of the bill
say oh no this has nothing to do it all
with denying services to gay people are gay couples are anti-gay discrimination
however if we go back to the initial conception
up the bill specifically in the conversation
from proponents of the bill at the at the it the
very beginning was the story from new mexico
were a gay couple actually sued over being denied
service so anybody who is telling you that this
SB 1062 arizona bill never had anything to do
with denying anything to two gay couples is lying because we knew from the start
that a specific case from New Mexico was
the reason they're so so that get that out of the way now that we've gotten
that out of the way
why did jan Brewer publicly say
she was vetoing the bill well she said in a nationally televised address from
Phoenix
that the bill was worded too broadly
and could result in unintended and negative consequences for the state
she also said that it didn't address a
specific are pressing concern and that has the potential
to create more problems than it purports to solve
I agree 100 percent this is
this is the libertarian fiscally conservative thing when that judge in
Virginia said listen
the ban on gay marriages serves no government
purpose your interest so we shouldn't have it that is a simple explanation up
libertarian conservative philosophy
if the law doesn't do anything positive then there is no reason to restrict
people's behavior and that's essentially what jan Brewer saying we would get
nothing
out of passing this bill and she is 100 percent right
but do we think that she actually believes that we're not a court
appointed legal advisers probably came up to her and said
this is going to be a disaster I don't even think it's that I think that if you
look at what happened
in the kinda interim period where it wasn't clear if the bill would be vetoed
by Governor Brewer
there were so many companies like Apple
American Airlines Marriott Delta Air Lines
even the Arizona Super Bowl committee who is in charge of the 2015 Super Bowl
which is slated to be in Arizona
all came out against the bill and the Super Bowl committee actually said they
didn't
say we would reconsider even having the Super Bowl here
if jan Brewer signed this bill but they did say
in their commitment to non-discrimination
they would have to reevaluate the effective the bill
on their decision to have the Super Bowl there if you read between the lines it
was clear what they were saying
I think this move by jan Brewer was not really directed
by her concerns about it may be discriminating against gay couples
I don't think she really cares about that one way or another I think she
cares about political expediency
and she does not want to lose the business up the Super Bowl
and all these other companies who who issued
its statement saying they were against the bill well it certainly wouldn't be
unusual for someone
I like her to make a a business decision
even though it's a you know the right decision here
and I also want to take it a step further let's assume for a second which
I don't believe
that the decision for jan Brewer was not guided by the potential
losing the Superbowl and so much other business to Arizona
nor by political expediency it was really guided by the fact that she
thought the bill might allow discrimination
or other unintended consequences let's not praise jan Brewer too much
for saying she doesn't want blatant and open discrimination in her state
because that's a pretty low bar is set for elected officials
dot yeah that would be pretty sad but the you know
regardless up her motivations here I i think
we we can be content with this we it's the right decision and that we can agree
with regardless of what else we disagree with just so you know other states
considering similar bills to the one that jan Brewer vetoed in Arizona
Georgia Hawaii Idaho Kansas main
Mississippi Missouri Oklahoma Ohio Oregon South Dakota and Tennessee 12
other states
we've spoken specifically about if you have these I think Idaho in Kansas
this is not a unique situation to Arizona