My kids are in grade school in CA and this law has received a lot of attention and caused a lot of worry among parents, but it's all nonsense. I've read the text of the law and in no way does it mandate a gay curricula.

What is does say is that you can't not teach about someone because they happened to be gay (or black, etc.). In no way does it say anything about having to teach anything about gay lifestyle or sexuality, or that you have to say anything about whether a historical figure was gay or not.

The article you refer to goes on at length about a high school teacher that has included a LGBT book in her curricula for the past 7 years. People can complain about that if they wish, but it has nothing to do with this law. And people who try to conflate the two are being disingenuous.

The opening sentence: "California will become the first state to require public schools to teach gay and lesbian history." is plain wrong. You can read the text of the bill and decide for yourself

The second para "...mandates that the contributions of gays and lesbians in the state and the country be included..." is a little closer to the mark.

That's closer to what I said in my original post, that is, the law says nothing about teaching gay sexuality, gay issues, gay lifestyles, or gay history. It says that people can't be excluded from the history books on the basis of being gay. Nothing wrong with that.

I've gone back and reread the text of the law and it's a little stronger in its wording than I remembered (it does in fact say that gay is a category along with women and minorities whose contributions need to be recognized specifically), but I've spoken with my school's principal and this law will effect zero change in our school's curriculum.

I don't think so. It's probably more likely the case that at my kids' ages history study mostly involves things like cutting Pilgrim hats out of construction paper on Thanksgiving.

As a category I can't imagine there's much in the way of homosexuals' contribution to "...the development of California and the United States." (quoted from the law) as a class of persons in any case. Not like, for example, black history which has been one of the defining aspects of American history from slavery, to the Civil War, to a century or so of civil rights struggles through the 70s. For example, I don't think there is a gay equivalent of the Tuskegee Airmen to teach about.

On the other hand, if high schools had to teach about gay civil rights struggles where we used to have laws on the books outlawing homosexuality and that it was not too long ago medically classified as a mental disorder, I don' think that's a bad thing.

Thanks. I expanded on my comment a little in my 19:28 post below, but in short I think that's a valid point that talking about the role of homosexuals in political, social development, etc., does in fact mean including gay issues and gay culture to a greater or lesser degree in school lessons.

I still do not see that in any way as a mandated gay curriculum, which to me would mean things like teaching kids about sexuality, but I'll leave it at that.

In curbing future immigration conservatives need to do it in a way that is not as easily portrayed as being xenophobic. You mention California yet fail to touch at all on Prop 187. The campaign around 187 became very polarized, its backers called it the "Save Our State" initiative and it wasn't too hard to add the implied "from Mexicans" onto the end of that.

During the 1994 election where Prop 187 was passed, latinos made up 25% of the population of California yet only 8% of the voters. In 2008 I saw an estimate that while then making up 33% of the population, latino voters would be 15% of the voters. So they have gone from about 1/3 latinos voting to roughly 1/2 voting. In that time the only Republican to win a major statewide office has been Arnie and he is not someone that could be called a conservative.

Between latinos and blacks and other minorities where the Democrats basically win 75% of the vote equalling around 25% of the California voters, it means Republicans need to win the white vote by a 55-45 margin to get to 50% overall.

Even at this point if you stop all immigration, the demographic trends will doom Republicans unless they can make greater in roads with latino voters.

I admire your ability to demonize both immigrants AND the LGBT community in a single post. Truly, well done.

It is certainly true that Latinos generally vote for Democrats- and so do blacks, single people, Jews, and others. They all do. That means that in left-wing places, such as CA, you get left-wing laws, like this farcical 'gay history' provision, or others, such as high taxes and a dreadful business climate. The immigrants are voting the way they think is best for them, and who can blame them? The GOP should make the case to immigrants as best it can, but as Mark mentions, 'marginal' folks generally go with the Dems. My reply is this: first of all, when they can vote on specific issues, like marriage, Latinos almost always vote for the measure to protect marriage, and usually by wide margins. There is also some variation between states on this, perhaps mirroring the state's white population: after the Panhandle, the highest margins for Texas' marriage amendment in 2005 were in counties in the heavily Hispanic counties in Southern Texas. So it is not as if Latino voters (or, for that matter, black voters) simply do whatever the Democratic party says. They vote for what they think is right, when given the chance. This suggests to me the need to continued direct democracy on some issues, such as marriage, where many Democratic voters may feel differently than most Democratic elected officials.

I'm a Catholic, and my grandfather was a very loyal Democrat and union member in Cleveland. He had 12 kids, and today 10 of the 12 are Republicans. Things changed with previous generations of Catholics, so that today white Catholics lean Republican, and the Catholic vote as a whole tends to swing back and forth. I think the same will eventually happen with Latinos: they will swing, even if they do not become Republicans, they will stop being loyal Democrats.

Finally, Mark paints things in far too dire terms: I'd say were currently see 'a chance' of conservative policies being enacted; although that doesn't always happen, we can't always get what we want.

"and if small-government, morally traditionalist, pro-sovereignty conservatism is to have any chance of lasting political success during our lifetimes,..."

One can only assume that by "morally traditionalist" you primarily mean squelching gay rights since Republicans seem to have no problem with serial adulterers like Gingrich. At any rate, the battle against marriage equality has already been lost, and not just due to Democrats or your dreaded immigrants but also because of the increasing ranks of younger Republicans and Independents who see how SSM is harmless. Credit is due however for creatively imagining, no matter how tenuous, a link between Immigrants and Gays - the two dreaded "Bogeymen" of the Far Right.

10 years ago no sates had gay marriage. Every poll done shows support for marriage equality is going up, and that's only going to continue. In fact polls are now showing its edging into a majority. Opposition against marriage equality is increasingly concentrated in the elderly, and the young are overwhelmingly in favor. You have to win every battle from now until the end of time, and we only have to win once. If that's your definition of losing, bring on the losing.