Serves the idiot right
via Ezra at Pandagon
Bush Refines His Position on a Measure Banning Gay Marriage
By RICHARD W. STEVENSON
…By hedging his position, if only a bit, Mr. Bush may have insulated himself somewhat from the sting of the defeat the proposed amendment suffered in the Senate on Wednesday. But the way in which the proposal went down with a whimper - short of a simple majority, much less the two-thirds of the Senate needed for approval - raised questions about whether the White House had fundamentally misjudged the nation's attitude on the issue. And the vote left even some of Mr. Bush's own advisers wondering if his backing of the amendment did not hurt him politically more than it helped by further stoking opposition to him from the left.
"It's a net loss for Republicans politically," said one prominent Republican in Washington who works closely with the White House. "It does nothing for our base, because they're grumpy about not having it, and it energized a significant portion of their base. I guarantee you that the gay community will give twice as much money and work harder for Kerry now, not so much because they care about marriage per se, but because this effort plays to their fears that we're homophobic."
While polling has generally found that most Americans are opposed to gay marriage, it has also shown that few people see the issue, or the proposal for a constitutional amendment that would define marriage as being only between a man and a woman, as being a priority for the country. Polls and focus groups have repeatedly found that the subject barely registers with voters, if it registers at all, at a time when most people are primarily concerned with Iraq, terrorism and jobs.
But wading into the issue was in keeping with the White House's overriding political priority, keeping Mr. Bush's base happy and energized, even at the risk of alienating moderate and swing voters who might see it as anti-gay.
