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Monday, July 24, 2006

Jamie Pedersen Was For Accusing Justices of Playing Politics Before He Was Against It

Posted by on July 24 at 10:11 AM

Jamie Pedersen, candidate in the 43rd District, said something remarkably impolitic a few months back. Pedersen’s entire campaign for Ed Murray’s old seat is based on his work on the gay marriage issue, and we’ve been waiting for a Washing State Supreme Court decision on gay marriage for what seems like years. Pedersen told the AP back in May that the justices were holding back their decision for purely political reasons.

A number of participants think justices will sit on it until after the election, because it’s such a hot-button issue, bound to anger the losing side and some voters.

“They’ll see the controversy and some will worry about re-election, and that’s a shame,” Pedersen says…

Last week Pedersen told the AP the exact opposite:

Jamie Pedersen, a lawyer representing the gay couples in the case, said he doesn’t fall into the camp of those who believed the court might delay the opinion for political reasons, and that he appreciates the care the court appears to be taking with the ruling. As a former law clerk, he said he knows how complex opinion-writing can be.

“Anytime somebody changes something in one opinion, the others get a chance to change what’s in their opinions,” he said. “They’ll issue the decision when they’re done writing it.”

That said, he’s eager to see the result.

“Obviously, we have all of our plaintiff couples and thousands of others in the state who live every day without the benefit of legal protection,” he said. “The sooner we get the ruling the better.”

So way back in May of 2006 Pedersen was solidly in the camp of folks who believed—perhaps correctly, although it’s impolitic to say so—that the court was delaying the gay marriage decision for purely political reasons. By July of 2006 Pedersen was the leading critic of “those who believed” the court is dragging this out for political reasons. Either Pedersen did his law clerking—which gave him so much perspective on the whole opinion-writing business—between May and July of 2006 or someone told Pedersen back in May that accusing WA’s Supreme Court justices of playing politics wasn’t a smooth political move.


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I have a great solution for this whole Jamie Pedersen dilemma: don't vote for Jamie Pedersen. Problem solved.

Don't vote for Jamie Pedersen, we don't need another gay man in state government. And just because you work for gay marriage doesn't mean you know what's good for gay people.

Dan's baaaack...

Flip.

Flop.

Um, aren't we going to have a gay state senator anyway? and that one's multi-issue ...

Yes, one gay senator. And three gay state reps. But no lesbians.

We don't need any more gay representatives in Olympia. Enough is enough.

look at that - dan's back!

Borrrinnngg. Way to tackle the big issues, Dan...


If he truly is about the gay community, he should support the election of a lesbian or transgendered individual to the state house-- that will allow for more representation in the community.

classic case of the political newbie swaying the breeze-- when we thought the court was sitting on it, he was anti-politics in justice, and now that the decision is coming out soon, before the primary election date which will be the climax of his political race, now he's stoked about the timing of the ruling and the lack of politics in the decision.

which is it, you weasel?

This is fairly similar to Pedersen's decision to remove references to his outside counsel work for the Seattle Monorail Project from his bio on the Preston Gates web site once he decided to run for office. Seems like we don't know which Pedersen we're going to get from one month to the next.

Ummmmm... That's not a flip flop, Dan...

The first one is Jamie saying that many folks thought the justices would wait until after the election, and then he explains why people are saying so.

Jamie has never thought they would wait that long, and has repeatedly said so to myself and a number of people who asked him.

Dan

We are all sorry that Jamie will not sleep with you. Get over it and move on!

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