Is any of this relevant to Judge Walker's ruling striking down Proposition 8?  g'day m8 
 
 Acknowledging his sexuality for the first time in public, Vaughn Walker, who left the U.S. District Court bench in February, and who declared Prop 8 unconstitutional and is now seeing his court ruling bandied about on appeal, told reporters today that not only is he a big ‘mo, but he’s also been in a relationship with his partner for 10 years.  Should judge have recused himself on Prop. The San Francisco Chronicle has reported that the fact that Judge Walker "is himself gay" is the "biggest open secret" in town.
– The judge who overturned California's ban on gay marriage acknowledged in an interview for the first time that he's homosexual and that he never considered recusing himself from the case. "If you thought a judge's sexuality, ethnicity, national origin (or) gender would prevent the judge from handling a case, that's a very slippery slope," retired federal Judge Vaughn Walker tells the San Francisco Chronicle. "I don't think it's relevant." The Chronicle actually reported on Walker's sexual orientation during the Prop 8 trial, prompting critics, like this one, to stay he should have stepped down because he had a conflict of interest. ("He and his partner are now permitted to marry!") Nope, says the gay blog Queerty after the Walker interview. "Immutable characteristics like sexuality, race, and gender are not judicial conflicts of interest."