House Speaker John Boehner hired a Conservative Attorney to defend the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and wants the Justice Department to pay for it - aka. your tax dollars will be used to pay for this legal defense. Of course, all conservatives applauded this move. So if using tax dollars to fund and defend a current law is "good use of money", how would Conservatives feel if Liberals want the Justice Department to pay for defending and upholding Roe v. Wade?
House Republicans have hired a former U.S. Solicitor General to defend the Defense of Marriage Act, and House Speaker John Boehner wants Justice Department money to pay bill from his blue-chip firm.
Paul Clement of the King & Spaulding law firm will defend the controversial 1996 law that defines and recognizes marriage only as the legal union of a man and a woman.
House Republicans assumed defense of DOMA after President Obama decided and Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the U.S. Justice Department would not defend DOMA before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Another former Solicitor General under Bush, Ted Olson, has been on the other side of the issue. Olson was a lead lawyer in the federal court suit against Proposition 8, the narrowly passed California measure that rolled back same sex marriage.
Boehner is arguing that Justice Department money should be “redirected” to pay Clement’s bills.
“Obviously, DOJ’s decision results in DOJ no longer needing the funds it would have otherwise expended defending the constitutionality of DOMA,” Boehner wrote Monday to House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi.
“It is my intent that those funds be diverted to the House for reinbursement of any costs incurred by and associated with the House, and not DOJ, defending DOMA.”
Boehner did not explain how he would calculate the money that the Justice Department would have expended — using its own lawyers — defending the 1996 law.
Pelosi delivered an icy rejoinder. She demanded to know how Boehner planned to calculate how much money the Justice Department would have spent: DOMA is currently the object of 12 challenges.
“The House of Representatives need not enter into this lengthy and costly litigation,” Pelosi told Boehner. Pelosi is a longstanding defender/advocate of gay rights. Link
This is big government money to define marriage! Didn't Conservatives all argued they want small Government and want Government out of our homes? You can't get homier than Marriage! So all your rhetoric -
"Keep government out of my rights to bear arms, out of my food pantry, out of my healthcare, etc" is just partisan. You want money spent on Conservative causes even though tax payers are a melting pot of diversity and a big majority of the populace don't think like you. Basically forcing your theocratic morality down the throats of the American people and telling them they have to pay for it!
With everything else that is going on in this country, is this really a priority?
So where are the jobs Boehner? Hiring one lawyer and paying him a fat salary does not help the American people!
Comments
That's your Rethuglican representative for ya!
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