Political predictions rarely hit the nail on the head. But journalists love to make them, and we keep reading them. Here’s one take on a possible scenario for the 2016 presidential election, with Republicans driving themselves to defeat by clinging bitterly to their opposition to gay marriage (along, presumable, with their guns and religion), via the Washington Post. I don’t think it will happen this way, but you never know.
More. A positive note—the Texas GOP’s looney gay-bashing helped lose Dallas the 2016 Republican Convention.
Furthermore. Another countertrend: working to bring the GOP around. As National Journal reports:
Similarly, rather than talking about gay marriage, strategists are guiding Republicans to talk about the freedom to marry, and they cast the question in familiar conservative terms about the government’s role in people’s private lives.
“Use freedom language, why it’s important for families, why it’s inappropriate for the government to treat people differently and treating gay people as taxpayers,” said one GOP gay-rights lobbyist.
And beyond changes to the rhetorical approach, the LGBT-rights community is bringing cash to the effort.
These efforts won’t change things tomorrow, but could do so down the road. As Darwin advised the animals, evolve or die.
Plus, National Journal on the importance of Carl DeMaio’s run.
19 Comments for “Portentous Prognostication”
posted by Jorge on
Munisteri said he doesn’t personally believe in the idea and doesn’t think a majority of the delegates at the convention favor it. But as a result of a parliamentary maneuver, it became necessary to keep the gay counseling proviso in the platform to pass the overall package.
I don’t often agree with Martin Luther King’s old complaint about how moderates hamper the Civil Rights Movement, but this excuse continues to annoy me. It was never necessary to pass the overall package.
I would probably jump at the chance to attend a RNC convention at Dallas and raise some heck.
Now that it’s in Ohio…
So Ohio Senator Rob Portman is considering a run for president, and he claims his support for gay marriage would be a plus in a general election…
The Republicans are going to divide on something.
A candidate on either side could self-destruct on this issue. The Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell repeal caused Rick Santorum to stumble when it appeared the audience booed a gay soldier and he didn’t react. Rather surprising it only caused him to stumble, isn’t it? Well that’s where you find the difference in quality between the candidates. Complications will come up and we will see the candidates for what they really are. Politics is about more than just what political position you take. It is also about who you are as a leader.
posted by Houndentenor on
It’s not just gay marriage. If you read the Texas GOP platform, it’s anti-gay period, not just against marriage equality. The 2016 GOP primary debates are going to outdo the 2012 disaster and alienate even more voters than they did then. I realize this is not a strategy for the national leadership, but they don’t seem to be able to reign in the crazy that now runs the party in the red states and other right wing areas. I’m not going to predict a winner this far out. One should never underestimate the ability of Democrats to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. The GOP on the advice of Karl Rove and others decided to alienate some groups in order to gain the votes of others. It worked but it was a short-sighted. The number of anti-gay people is dwindling. Other groups have friends and coworkers and in-laws. They created this monster and now they can’t control it. I’d revel in the Schadenfreude except that it’s not defeated, especially not at the state and local level much less the national one. I am stuck in deep Teabagistan for another year or so and it’s scary to think what our country would look like if these nutjobs actually achieved national power.
posted by Don on
You nailed it. It’s a fundamentalist mindset. Rushing to be “more holy than thou” and it requires a constant upping the ante along the religion’s tenets. The original religious message is lost and the race is on. You can see it playing out with tougher sentencing laws. More restrictive abortion laws.
Ask the muslims how restricted women should be to prevent men from ungodly temptation? The answer gets more stringent every year.
Like the luddites, these movements eventually flame out. But it always gets worse before it gets better. While Mississippi and Alabama have always been stellar in this area, I believe Texas and Oklahoma will duke it out for the title of “most piously mean to their fellow Americans.” And it ain’t just us they’re after. We’re just more fashionable at this juncture in history.
posted by Houndentenor on
Texas is creeping towards purple, or will be when Democrats decide to show up. It’s hard to win an election when you don’t even bother running a candidate.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
I have no idea how the 2016 Republican presidential candidates/nominee will handle the expected 2016 Supreme Court decision mandating marriage equality in the states — it depends on whether the decision lands in the middle of the primaries or after a defacto nominee has been identified, for one thing, and if after a defacto nominee has been identified, who that nominee is — but I do know that the Republican response to the opinion is going to set the course for the party for the election cycle and, most likely, one or two election cycles beyond.
I do not expect a candidate/nominee to embrace marriage equality. It seems to me that this would be a bridge too far, given the entrenched opposition to “equal means equal” among the base.
I hope that the candidate/nominee will accept the decision as the law of the land and encourage Republicans and the country at large to accept the decision as the law of the land. It seems to be that this would be the best course for the party and for the country.
I fear, though, that the candidate/nominee will not accept the decision, but instead repudiate the decision as “judicial tyranny” and/or a “violation of state’s rights” and vow resistance, ranging from nullification to “religious exemption” to a constitutional amendment empowering the states to define marriage, and so on.
We will just have to see what happens.
A lot depends, I suspect, on whether opinion within the Republican Party shifts significantly over the next 18 months. At present opposition to marriage equality among self-identified Republicans remains high, but seems to be changing in the right direction. I think that we’ve all be surprised at the speed with with Americans as a whole have come to embrace marriage equality, and I won’t fall off my chair in shock if the Republican nut begins to crack as reality sets in.
posted by Mark on
I expect that what we’ll see will be a very quick shift (with Stephen’s strong support, given his previous posts) to demands to grant business owners a right to discriminate against gay and lesbian customers, along with perhaps more ambitious proposals. Who will be the first 2016 Republican candidate to say that businesses whose health care plans cover workers’ families have the right to refuse coverage to families headed by same-sex couples?
The beauty of this approach for Republicans is that it can unite anti-gay social conservatives claiming religious liberty with libertarian types (I can already see the celebratory columns from Conor Friedersdorf) who claim to be strong supporters of the Civil Rights Act but don’t have any problem with businesses having a legal right to refuse service to gays.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
I expect that what we’ll see will be a very quick shift … to demands to grant business owners a right to discriminate against gay and lesbian customers, along with perhaps more ambitious proposals.
I expect that development, too, but it is an approach that has its perils considering that the position is definitely a minority position.
A recent Public Religion Research Institute poll showed that only about 15% of Americans support the right of businesses to refuse service to gays and lesbians in general, and less than 40% support the right of businesses in the wedding industry to refuse services to gays and lesbians on religious grounds.
Americans place a high value on fair dealing, and if Republicans are foolish enough to hitch the party wagon to “religious exemption”, that position is going to cost them two or three election cycles down the road when the so-called “religious exemption” is seen for what it is — an sham intended to permit discrimination against gays and lesbians, and gays and lesbians alone.
posted by Mark on
I’m a little skeptical of polling on this issue because it’s so new, and because framed differently (should religious business owners be free to serve on the basis of their beliefs?), I’d guess you’d get a higher number.
One important element of the looming religious liberty fight–they’ll be prominent gay writers–people like Stephen, or depending on the day of the week Andrew Sullivan–who will defend the right to discriminate. This will make it harder to continue to portray the argument as antigay.
The logic of Hobby Lobby also will make it hard on health insurance issues for gay employees who work for anti-gay owners to win in court if they want to obtain coverage for their families. Hard to know how that will play in the public.
posted by Jorge on
One important element of the looming religious liberty fight–they’ll be prominent gay writers–people like Stephen, or depending on the day of the week Andrew Sullivan–who will defend the right to discriminate. This will make it harder to continue to portray the argument as antigay.
That’s usually how it works in a free country where different people have different points of view, yeah. There must be some use competing for the leadership of a progressive community even one has no hope of success.
(This will make it harder to continue to portray the argument as antigay.)
Well, then. If we can get that much done then we’ve got work to do.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
One important element of the looming religious liberty fight–they’ll be prominent gay writers–people like Stephen, or depending on the day of the week Andrew Sullivan–who will defend the right to discriminate. This will make it harder to continue to portray the argument as antigay.
Yes, we will.
But the proposed “religious freedom” laws speak for themselves – the laws proposed so far are transparent attempts to allow businesses run by conservative Christians to refuse to provide goods and services to gays and lesbians and only gays and lesbians — and Americans are not fools.
We have heard this all before. Republican-oriented gays and lesbians have been banging the “anti-progressive” drum for years and years. When we started to push for marriage equality in earnest, we were berated for “moving too far, too fast”, and told that we needed to give social conservatives time to adjust to change. When we started winning over the American people, we were berated for pushing for marriage equality instead of accepting the “civil union compromise”. When we turned to the courts, we were denounced for adopting a “reckless”, “roll-the-dice” strategy rather than working through the political process. When we started winning in case after case, we were denigrated a “poor winners” And now, when we oppose efforts to emasculate “equal means equal” through religious exemptions, we are portrayed as anti-Christian tyrants unwilling to live and let live.
None of it got any traction. It won’t this time, either.
The reason that it won’t is that the so-called “religious freedom” argument is demolished by a single question: If religious freedom is the concern, why do your proposals limit religious freedom exemptions to a single religion, a single issue, and a single class? When that question is asked, and the “answers” heard, Americans will see the so-called “religious freedom” exemptions for what they are.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
A positive note — the Texas GOP’s looney gay-bashing helped lose Dallas the 2016 Republican Convention.
I wonder if it might a useful exercise to compare the 2014 Texas Republican platform with the 2012 national Republican platform on the issues.
With the exception of the reparative therapy plank, and tub-thumping about “the fundamental unchanging truths that have been ordained by God in the Bible”, the 2014 Texas platform isn’t substantively too different than the 2012 national platform.
I think that the problem with the Texas platform is that it is too explicit for today’s “tone it down” Republican strategy. I’ll be curious to see how the 2016 national platform handles the issues.
posted by Houndentenor on
So much for gays and gay allies making progress within the GOP. I live in Texas and that is the party’s platform. A recap for those who missed it (it’s online in pdf format): (p.14)
Homosexuality- Homosexuality is a chosen behavior that is contrary to the fundamental unchanging truths that have been ordained by God in the Bible, recognized by our nation’s
founders, and shared by the majority of Texans. Homosexuality must not be presented as an acceptable alternative lifestyle, in public policy, nor should family be redefined to include
homosexual couples. We believe there should be no granting of special legal entitlements or creation of special status for homosexual behavior, regardless of state of origin. Additionally,
we oppose any criminal or civil penalties against those who oppose homosexuality out of faith, conviction, or belief in traditional values.
Reparative Therapy- We recognize the legitimacy and efficacy of counseling, which offers reparative therapy and treatment for those patients seeking healing and wholeness from their
homosexual lifestyle. No laws or executive orders shall be imposed to limit or restrict access to this type of therapy.
That’s the GOP where I live. There’s no way I can vote for or support anyone running on such a platform. To even suggest that I or anyone who isn’t an anti-gay bigot could vote for someone running on that platform is absurd.
posted by Aubrey Haltom on
Well, here’s Gov. Christie with a version of how to be against equality, while not seeming as rabid as others. I think he’s following Rand Paul’s idea re: marriage equality. Trumpet it as a state’s issue, accept those states that have recognized equality, while ‘fighting’ everywhere else.
And just like Senator Paul’s position, this ‘approach’ by Christie reeks of political posturing
http://time.com/2978824/chris-christie-gay-marriage/
posted by Tom Scharbach on
Christie’s “it is settled law but we should still fight it nationwide” is about the best we can expect of the GOP right now. The question is whether the Republican 2016 nominee will treat the matter as “settled law” once the Supreme Court rules.
posted by Doug on
The evangelical right will never give up the fight against LGBT rights no matter what the Supreme Court says. It will be just like abortion, which the evangelical right has been fighting for decades.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
The question is not what the evangelical right (e.g. Land, Vander Plaats, Huckabee, Reed, Perkins, Frischer et al) will do when the Supreme Court decision lands — that is entirely predictable and I can write the press releases right now with 99% certainty — but what the 2016 Republican presidential nominee (or, in the alternative, if the nominee has not yet been anointed, the 2016 Republican presidential candidates) will do.
posted by Tom Jefferson III on
I suspect that Governor Christie is trying to take a position that can appeal to “moderate-swing voters”, while still being able to sell a “no gay marriage ever” message to voters when useful (in terms of votes or fundraising). Will this work within the GOP, much less the general election? Maybe.
GOP primary voters tend to be pretty “hardcore” conservatives, not especially keen on RINO candidates (much less the party’s center-left historical roots).
I am not sure that this “See, I am a moderate Republican candidate, and I am also a socially conservative-no homo- marriage Republican candidate” will work.
Independent-swing voters are generally thought of as being pretty easy to manipulate and spin.
However, likely primary voters tend to be much more ideological and active in ideological groups, if not local party politics.
posted by Don on
Christie’s approach will appease no one. In fact, it will infuriate everyone. Evangelicals are not stupid people. They may hold what some would call fantastical beliefs, but they have decided in biblical inerrancy as a foundational belief and won’t move off that.
That, in no way, means they cannot smell political posturing from 1,000 miles away. And I think it is a fatal mistake for Christie. His claim to fame is straight talk about the issues of the day. Dissembling something this obvious and this big is a huge mistake. IMHO.
posted by Tom Scharbach on
In Wisconsin (and perhaps the rest of the country) hard core social conservatives have given notice that they won’t be satisfied with pabulum.