The Bilerico Project | Daily experiments in LGBTQ

The argument about how much the attorneys the House is hiring to defend DOMA in court will cost is stupidity on a stick for a variety of reasons and reminds me of the argument that states shouldn't try to pass marriage bans because they should be focused on jobs. OK, I can buy that for five seconds, but then where are the gays when a state is considering expanding partnership recognition? Are they arguing that passing civil union legislation in Hawaii or out-of-state marriage recognition in Washington are wastes of time?

The cost argument sounds DC and maybe HRC is advancing it to the right audience in the Beltway since most Americans frankly have the slightest clue about what makes up the federal deficit, but the fact is Republicans just plain don't care about the deficit and, on that count, they're completely right (especially since we're talking about almost nothing in the context of the federal spending). Government spending isn't a problem when it hits an arbitrary value, but when it starts competing for scarce human resources with other employers. There's no shortage in the supply of labor in today's economy, and it's not like we're going to run out of lawyers in the US or that the economy is going to be hurt by spending a little more on something that will create work.

"Given that a majority of Americans oppose DOMA and would rather see the Republican leadership tackle jobs and the economy, it's not surprising that he won't come clean on this or a number of other unanswered questions about the cases," [HRC's] Cole-Schwartz said.

The top story about Congressional Republicans last week was them tackling the economy to the ground and beating it to a pulp.... It's been brewing for months and I don't see how Republicans could spend more time talking about the budget.

We shouldn't be borrowing arguments from tea baggers, especially when those arguments are designed to stop the government from creating jobs for everyone. Deficit fear is one of the main tools used in DC to justify not creating jobs and not helping the economy, a position that increases unemployment and makes jobs particularly scarce for employees at the bottom of the ladder.

Just fighting for a fair piece of the pie, like employment protections would do, isn't good enough; we should be fighting for a bigger pie. And make no mistake about it: deficit scare-mongering is a fancy way of begging for a smaller pie.