IGF CultureWatch

The New York Times takes note of the president's deliberately ambiguous language:

" President Bush never used the words "gay," "homosexual," "same-sex" or "amendment." Instead of an amendment, he referred only to a "constitutional process." And, as he has in the past, he qualified the present need for such a process. "

Some conservatives found fault with his reluctance. "He made the case for the necessity of an amendment, and I am puzzled as to why he did not, having diagnosed the problem, prescribe the only remedy, a federal marriage amendment," said Dr. Richard Land, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention....

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, said Mr. Bush's failure to ask Congress to get to work on an amendment negated his other initiatives.

However:

Some gay Republicans said the president had gone too far.
"We will not stand with anyone who is willing to write discrimination into the Constitution," said Patrick Guerriero, executive director of the Log Cabin Republicans.

But Charles Francis, chairman of the Republican Unity Coalition and a family friend of President Bush, said he was not yet ready to break ranks. He emphasized that the president had not mentioned an amendment and that his comments about the "constitutional process" remained conditional, although he acknowledged, "He has come about as close as he can get."

Will the religious right be placated by rhetoric minus an actual endorsement of and lobbying for the amendment? Or will Bush be pushed into giving anti-gay activists what they want, and thereby alienate the moderates and independents who don't cotton to legislative gay-bashing? Stay tuned.

A new ABCNEWS/Washington Post survey has some good news: only 38% of Americans favor amending the U.S. Constitution to make it illegal for same-sex couples to marry, while 58% say, instead, that each state should make its own laws on gay marriage. If history is any guide, a proposed constitutional amendment that can't even get a majority of popular support is doomed.

But States Go Crazy.

On the other hand, some states seem to be reacting to the prospects of gay marriage in Massachusetts with total dementia. Ohio's legislature has just passed a bill that would not only prohibit same-sex marriage, but also forbid the state from granting domestic partner benefits to its employees. Gov. Bob Taft said he will sign it, pending legal review.

In Virginia, a House panel unanimously passed a resolution Wednesday urging Congress to propose a constitutional amendment against gay marriages. But a bill to impeach Virginia judges if they were to rule in favor of same-sex marriage was defeated. How charitable.

And what of the Democrats? Here's an excerpt from Bob Roehr's report in the Windy City Times:

Gays and lesbians who stayed tuned for the Democratic response hoping for a defense on these issues were sadly disappointed, even though it was delivered by Senate leader Tom Daschle and one of the most pro-gay members of Congress, House leader Nancy Pelosi.

There was not one word on HIV or on any gay issue even though press accounts in the days leading up to the speak noted a slight increase in domestic AIDS funding in the President's proposed budget and his intent to defend traditional marriage.

Senator John Kerry, the upset winner in the Democratic caucuses in Iowa the previous day, defended his 1996 vote against DOMA in an interview on ABC News. He called his vote a denouncement of the "gay bashing" that took place during the Senate debate on that legislation. He was one of only 14 Senators vote against the bill. However, Kerry said that when it comes to gay marriage, "I have the same position as the President."

From the president's State of the Union address:

A strong America must also value the institution of marriage. I believe we should respect individuals as we take a principled stand for one of the most fundamental, enduring institutions of our civilization. Congress has already taken a stand on this issue by passing the Defense of Marriage Act, signed in 1996 by President Clinton. That statute protects marriage under Federal law as the union of a man and a woman, and declares that one state may not redefine marriage for other states.

Activist judges, however, have begun redefining marriage by court order, without regard for the will of the people and their elected representatives. On an issue of such great consequence, the people's voice must be heard. If judges insist on forcing their arbitrary will upon the people, the only alternative left to the people would be the constitutional process. Our nation must defend the sanctity of marriage.

The outcome of this debate is important -- and so is the way we conduct it. The same moral tradition that defines marriage also teaches that each individual has dignity and value in God's sight.

Bush does not endorse a specific constitutional amendment, but "if judges" mandate same-sex marriage, he would favor supporting traditional marriage through the "constitutional process." Still, that won't be enough to stop criticism from the right. Already, a press release has been issued from the Family Research Council's Tony Perkins, who declares:

Sixty-four days ago the Massachusetts State Supreme Court tossed a cultural time bomb into the public square when they mandated the Legislature to create homosexual marriages. Disappointingly, this evening in his State of the Union address, President Bush promised to help the families of America -- after the bomb goes off and the damage is done. Now is the time, before the Court of Massachusetts imposes same sex marriage on America, to protect the sacred and irreplaceable institution of marriage.

The President should immediately call upon Congress to pass an amendment this year to the Constitution codifying into law what history and nature has taught us -- marriage is between a man and a woman.

The families of America have consistently supported the President on both his foreign and domestic policies. They have stood with him in his efforts of homeland security and now they want the President to focus on the security of the American home by protecting the institution of marriage.

But Bush has not done so, at least not to the extent the religious right's leaders are demanding. Of course, he's now opened the way to discussing the "constitutional process," which could jeopardize our rights to equality under the law. He should be called to account for that, although I wish there'd be some acknowledgement by gay leaders that his position is far more ambiguous than the religious right expected from their man.

Last week, Judge Charles W. Pickering of Mississippi accepted President Bush's offer of a recess appointment to a long-vacant Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals slot -- an end-run that bypassed Senate Democrats who had filibustered Pickering's confirmation. Much consternation was expressed by the left.

But despite his opponents' charges of "racial insensitivity," Pickering has a long and distinguished civil rights record that includes bravely testifying for the prosecution in a criminal hate-murder case against the Ku Klux Klan. Also not widely reported were his rulings regarding gays and lesbians. In 1991, Pickering sharply rebuked an attorney who tried to use a plaintiff's homosexuality in a fraud trial, saying "Homosexuals are as much entitled to be protected from fraud as any other human beings." And in 1994 he stopped an anti-gay citizens group in the town of Ovett, Mississippi, from using the courts to harass Camp Sister Spirit, a lesbian community. "The judge who threw out the anti-Camp Sister Spirit case and rebuked homophobia from the bench in the Deep South over ten years ago deserves a promotion," according to a statement last year from the Log Cabin Republicans.

The Human Rights Campaign, which was part of the Democratic coalition that opposed Pickering, condemned his appointment, making much of remarks by Pickering 20 years ago before a Baptist group in which he briefly mentioned divorce and homosexuality as social ills. Not exactly fire and brimstone, and it's the worst that liberal gays could find.

Once again, the broad--based liberal-left agenda of the gay "mainstream" takes precedence over support for fair-minded conservatives.

The Right and the Left, Again.

Sunday's New York Times reported that:

[Sandy] Rios of Concerned Women for America said Mr. Bush had implicitly endorsed gay unions. "It is the same as saying the federal government doesn't want to weigh in on slavery, but if the states want to call it chattel that is O.K," Ms. Rios said.

By the way, right-winger Rios was condemning the same Bush statements that the left-wing National Gay & Lesbian Task Force called "a declaration of war on gay America."

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1/11/03 - 1/17/04

"Bush Plans $1.5 Billion Drive for Promotion of Marriage," reports the New York Times. The program includes "training to help couples develop interpersonal skills that sustain 'healthy marriages.' -- Aside from the fact that the this reeks of the sort of nanny state-social worker meddling that Democrats usually specialize in, there's no basis in the U.S. Constitution for making taxpayer-funded marriage counseling a responsibility of the federal government.

But politically speaking, it's clear Bush is hoping to placate the GOP's religious right base with a $1.5 billion "pro marriage" payoff, and perhaps avoid being pressed into endorsing the far more controversial anti-gay Federal Marriage Amendment championed by social conservatives. As the Times noted:

[Administration] officials said they believed that the measure was especially timely because they were facing pressure from conservatives eager to see the federal government defend traditional marriage, after a decision by the highest court in Massachusetts. The court ruled in November that gay couples had a right to marry under the state's Constitution.

The religious right is clearly hoping the marriage initiative will be just an appetizer to the anti-gay amendment main course, but Bush, I think, is hoping it will be enough to satiate the social right's rank and file voters, if not its virulently homophobic leaders.

My IGF co-editor, Jonathan Rauch, makes a powerful case for ending the ban on immigrnants with HIV. The piece is titled "Bad Blood."
[Hyperlink is now fixed]

Here's a nice column from USA Today in which a gay couple from Washington state discuss their decision to legally wed in Canada [note, when originally posted I mistakenly described the couple as Canadian]. It's called "Marriage Strengthens Bond of Same-Sex Couples, Too."

More Recent Postings

1/11/03 - 1/17/04

There's a fair amount of misleading reporting around Vice President Dick Cheney's recent comments on a proposed anti-gay marriage amendment. Cheney said in an interview that "the president is going to have to make a decision in terms of what administration policy is on this particular provision, and I will support whatever decision he makes." Cheney declined to say whether he has discussed the issue of same-sex marriage with the president, the Denver Post reports, or shared his perspective as the parent of a gay daughter.
"I don't talk about the advice I give the president," Cheney said. "That is why he listens."

Some media are reporting that "Cheney says he will support a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage," choosing to ignore the conditional tone of his statement, just as the New York Times misreported the story when Bush said he'd support such an amendment "if necessary" (and instead reported it as "Bush will").

It should come as no surprise that Cheney promises to support any decision the president might eventually make. That's his job. But it's not the same as saying that he personally favors such a ban. And it certainly doesn't tell us what Cheney is advising the president to do.

You don't have to be Bush backer to believe that getting the facts right is important when it comes to trying to prevent Bush/Cheney from making an actual endorsement of the amendment. They have not done so, though they may be floating trial balloons, or trying to placate the religious right without taking any action. As I've said before, declaring that they have endorsed the amendment is not only bad reporting, it's surrendering well before the battle's over.

"Group opposed to gay marriage assailed for hiding poll results," reads the Boston Herald headline. Seems that the Massachusetts Family Institute / Coalition for Marriage released only those portions of a new Zogby poll that supported their position - and hid the fact that a narrow majority in the Bay State oppose their drive to ban gay marriage by amending the state constitution.

The Boston Globe followed up, quoting a coalition spokesman who says he merely "misspoke" on the poll findings. By the way, they also have a bridge in Brooklyn they're looking to sell.

Adventures in Hetero-Marriage Land.

Libertarian-minded columnist and IGF contributing author Deroy Murdock takes a look at the Britney Speakrs/Jason Allen Alexander quickie nuptials and quicker annulment. He writes (on the conservative National Review Online site):

Whatever objections they otherwise may generate, gay couples who desire marriage at least hope to stay hitched. Britney's latest misadventure, in contrast, reduced marriage from something sacred to just another Vegas activity, like watching the Bellagio Hotel's fountains between trips to the blackjack tables. "

"social conservatives who blow their stacks over homosexual matrimony's supposed threat to traditional marriage tomorrow should focus on the far greater damage that heterosexuals are wreaking on that venerable institution today.

And liberal columnist Ellen Goodman had this to say:

Britney and Jason were granted an annulment in 55 hours on the grounds that they lacked "understanding of each other's actions in entering upon this marriage." Compare them to gay couples who "understand" each other and commitment but are kept legally single. "

And the idea that same-sex marriage somehow disparages heterosexual marriage? We can put that to rest. Who needs gay couples when you have Britney and Jason?

Gays a Threat to Marriage?

According to a new survey, typical urban-dwellers now spend much of their adult lives unmarried - either dating or single (or, in the case of gay couples, unable to wed). According to the Washington Post:

"What's going on now is making the sexual revolution of the '60s and '70s pale in comparison," says Eli Coleman, director of the Program in Human Sexuality at the University of Minnesota. He called [the new survey from the University of Chicago] the most comprehensive since that of acclaimed researcher Alfred Kinsey, who surveyed people about sex in the 1940s

However,

"social services, the church and law enforcement have been slow to address this latest sexual revolution. -- "It's not approved. It's not talked about," [project leader Edward] Laumann says. "Or they just look the other way."

Or they pretend that gay marriage would somehow be the real threat to the culture of marriage!

IGF's Paul Varnell has more to say on the hypocrisy of gay marriage opponents in his new posting, "Anti-Love Isn't Pro Marriage."
- Stephen H. Miller

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