Playing Politics With Data - And People's Lives

The Census Bureau says that when it conducts the 2010 census, it will not report as married those same-sex couples who in fact are legally married. Instead, the Bureau essentially plans – in the words of one couple highlighted in the Post’s coverage of this policy – to “Photoshop them out of the picture.” According to Census Bureau official Martin O’Connell, “If a respondent refers to a person of the same gender as their ‘husband/wife’ on the 2010 census form, the Census Bureau will automatically assign them to the ‘unmarried partner’ category. Legally married same-sex couples will be indistinguishable in census data from those who choose ‘unmarried partner’ to describe their relationship.” The Bureau describes this sleight of hand as “editing.”

[Rocco]

As usual, homophobia trumps intellectual honesty and data..

[CockroachSleeper]

once again:

buy yourself a gun, and start protecting yourselves. the cockroaches do not like you, and will kill you when given the chance.

christian = cockroach
cockroach = christian

[Rocco]

Now lets not go overboard. I have bear spray for camping trips in Canada. Do they make an evangelical protestant spray that is effective from 30 feet away?

[JaneKrahe]

I'm not sure, but if you anwer your door naked wearing a pentacle, you scare away Jehovah's Witnesses. My friends discovered this.

[artemis]

So if we're not included in the data, we don't exist. Hey, that just doesn't work. Never has, never will. We'll continue to live our lives despite your data and in fact, because of it. Ignoring me and mine will not make me go away, won't change the way I live, and won't change who I am. Nothing can...or will.

[The Golem]

Sounds like another triumph of the Bush Administration over scientific facts.

[Robert In West Hollywood]

Rocco wrote:

Now lets not go overboard. I have bear spray for camping trips in Canada. Do they make an evangelical protestant spray that is effective from 30 feet away?

Yeah, it's called 'Freak-B-Gone..."

[Ralph]

Reminds me of A.G. John Ashcroft, and his ordering that a robe be put over a statue of a nude. Typical right-wing coverup (pun intended).

[Occono]

Yay! More Gay Pride Parades!

[Norm]

It's the ostrich syndrome. Religion suffers from this syndrome too. Pretend it's not there and it's not, or so they think. Fools. Lets not deal with reality.

[kooky]

Rocco wrote:

Now lets not go overboard. I have bear spray for camping trips in Canada. Do they make an evangelical protestant spray that is effective from 30 feet away?

Yeah, it's called gay spray. LOL Just kidding. I do think that the census bureau will screw this up, as they have in the past, because some people have names where you can not distiguish whether they are male or female. Their information will be a mess - again.

[kooky]

JaneKrahe wrote:

I'm not sure, but if you anwer your door naked wearing a pentacle, you scare away Jehovah's Witnesses. My friends discovered this.

Hey, that worked for me too, but some of the guys did look like they wanted to come in anyway.....

[CockroachSleeper]

hahaha... that's so awesome... i love it. you make me laugh. you sooooo funny. LOL. i gonna you laughy, cause you make me giggle soooooo long.

Jaguar wrote:

I have to say first, that I didn't read all of the story. I was starting to go crosseyed half way through it. What I did read, started sounding like just a big list of excuses. The bottom line is a boy took a gun to school and shot a fellow student to death. No excuses, no justification, no anything else, that's it, done deal. While the reasons matter to us, though both boy's behaivour and both boy's familey life could be pointed at and discussed for years, in the end, it's still a murder and the boy that pulled the trigger should face the consiquences of his actions.

wait... the giggles are done now. if you don't take your birth seriously, then end of story. for me and my fellow human beings, we understand all to well that the cockroaches do not like you, and will kill you when given the chance. my humble opinion, buy yourself a gun.

christian = cockroach
cockroach = christian

[CockroachSleeper]

and, so

hahaha... that's so awesome... i love it. you make me laugh. you sooooo funny. LOL. i gonna call you laughy, cause you make me giggle soooooo long.

kooky wrote:

<quoted text> Hey, that worked for me too, but some of the guys did look like they wanted to come in anyway.....

wait... the giggles are done now. if you don't take your birth seriously, then end of story. for me and my fellow human beings, we understand all to well that the cockroaches do not like you, and will kill you when given the chance. my humble opinion, buy yourself a gun.

christian = cockroach
cockroach = christian

[aRodeojock]

This is one lawsuit from CA or MA away from a Supreme Court decision. Federal funding and redistricting rests on this data. I can't see the Shrub Admin getting away with this one now. They could have just forced the Gay Marriage hands into the SCOTUS's hands without realizing it.

Frakkin morons. They will never learn.

[cross99]

The whole idea of not counting a same-sex marriage as a legal marriage in those states that allow it is similar to what the Census Bureau did with the slaves before the Civil War where they were only counted as 3/5 of a person. Seems the US Government does not really want to know how many gay and lesbian married couples there really are. And wasn't it not until the 2000 Census that they actually asked about sexual orientation? Another BIG cover-up in the history of the United States. Of course with our present administration, that doesn't surprise me.

[cross99]

JaneKrahe wrote:

I'm not sure, but if you anwer your door naked wearing a pentacle, you scare away Jehovah's Witnesses. My friends discovered this.

Works with the Mormon's and Born Again Christians too. Just did the other day. They won't be coming back to my house anytime soon.

[Dasein9]

Okay, on the one hand, the Census is a huge project, and the forms and means of tabulating data have been in development since the last Census.

On the other hand, they've had marriage in Massachussets for quite some time now, and have a year and a half to develop the forms and tabulations for California.

While it's not a simple and easy thing to alter, it seems to me the time and expense are worth it if the Census is going to be accurate.

[Junker]

Regardless if they were to report the marriages in MA and CA it will still not give us an accurate number as to how many gay couples have taken advantage of legal marriage in these two states. It would not show us how many couples from other states made the trip to CA in order to exchange vows.

If we had an accurate number of marriages and on civil unions it might take away their argument that very few gays take advantage of the right to marry. I am sure that we have all heard that more than once from our resident troll.