Politicians avoid gay marriage debate, leaving action to courts

townhall.com ^ | 11/21/03 | Jonah Goldberg

[kattracks]

There's an interesting contradiction at the heart of the gay marriage debate. Everyone agrees that we are well on our way to living in a country where allowing same-sex marriage is the law of the land, and yet virtually no major national politician and neither of the major political parties supports the idea.

When the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled that it is flatly irrational and bigoted to oppose gay marriage, no one was surprised when President Bush complained that the court had violated the "principle" that marriage is between a man and a woman.

[NutCrackerBoy]

Though a great many conservatives disagree, civil unions strike me as the right balance between principle and tolerance. Marriage has a specific meaning: a union of a man and a woman. But the state shouldn't bar gays or anyone else from naming heirs or sharing property as they see fit. -Jonah Goldberg

I agree, but that isn't what most people mean by the term civil union. It should be called perhaps personal partnership contract: a formal agreement between two or more cohabiting persons spelling out what happens when one person dies or leaves the home.

[NutCrackerBoy]

In a healthier polity, the Massachusetts legislature and the U.S. Congress would explore impeachment proceedings against the judges who've exceeded their mandates while at the same time displaying the necessary courage to deal with these issues themselves. -Jonah Goldberg

I'm surprised Jonah came right out and said it. It is considered vulgar to utter the i-word in connection with lawless judges. Of course it is fair game at any time when said of the President of the other party.

[ricktex401]

Goldberg has embraced the slippery slope. By approving civil unions he in fact states that gay relationships are healthy and positive. Schools will continue to force this lifestyle on our kids as a wonderful relationship from which you cannot change. Nothing could be further from the truth. I am convinced words will no longer carry the day. The media, the academy, the politicians are no longer open to the conservative and family side of this argument. We need to march. We need several million to crowd the Mall in DC and tell our supposed representatives that we will not sit by and let this country be run down the drain by a small segment of amoral liberals. Its time to march

[ricktex401]

Mr Goldberg, your embrace of civil unions as a sensible compromise to Gay Marriage is one more signpost on the way as we slouch to Gomorrah. Homosexuality, especially in males, is an extrememely destructive habit and lifestyle. This behavior kills millions prematurely and is indeed counter to our nature and the spirit God placed within us. By embracing civil unions, you by association purpetuate the positive characterization of this lifestyle by the schools, governments and corporate institutions. Thousands of mixed up teenage men and women will allowed to be seduced by counselors and others that being gay is what they were meant and can only be. The reparative therapists, Exodus Intl, and even religous readings from the Bible will be driven out of society by speech codes (as is being done in Britain and Canada now). For what good? so another few hundred thousand men can contract AIDs in anonymous sex encounters in Gay clubs and bathhouses? Why do we as a society look in revulsion at the danger of loaded guns in a house...perchance a child could have an accident, yet allow this sexual behavior to continue that kills millions of young men? Why do we treat the Blues as a disorder requiring therapy and drugs to correct (Seasonal Affectiveness Disorder) and claim that this behavior, that kills so many, and directly counters human physiology is just fine? If there is a positive good to allowing this behavior to be seen as normal, I have missed it. It is that this behavior has infected our elites in academia, media and politics that we, not wanting to appear as a "neanderthal" withhold judgement about which we know in our hearts and in our scripture is wrong on so many levels. Count yourself part of that pack.

[NutCrackerBoy]

The most significant thing though was his recommendation for the people of Massachusetts to pursue impeachment of the SJC justices. We are organizing to do just that.