And, this being the first show of the year, it's also an opportunity to take a quick look back at what I consider the Good News of the Year for 2015.We had some good news over the course of the year:
- Four states with did away with or suspended the use of the death penalty, those four being Connecticut, Maryland, Nebraska, and Pennsylvania.
- The US re-established diplomatic relations with Cuba.
- A highly-effective Ebola vaccine has been developed.
- Despite the barriers thrown up by SCOTUS, some states have found ways to tighten gun control laws that have gained approval from the courts.
- The Keystone XL pipeline was rejected.
But the Good News of the Year, for me, was an easy call: It came on June 26, the day the Supreme Court announced its decision that state bans on same-sex marriage are unconstitutional.As I said at the time, make no mistake: This is an historic decision. This is our generation's Loving v. Virginia, which struck down bans on interracial marriage. This is our Brown v. Board of Education, which banned racial segregation in public schools. This case, known as Obergefell v. Hodges, will in the future be referred to as a case that significantly advanced human rights in this country.
As I had cause to say then and later, this was not the end of the issue of LGBTQ rights or, as it turned out, even of marriage rights, as Kim Davis's nonsense proved.
But none of that changes the, again, historic nature of the decision and it is my Good News of the Year for 2015.
Sources cited in links:
http://whoviating.blogspot.com/2015/07/2105-scotus-rules-on-same-sex-marriage.html
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