Posted on 11/04/2004 9:58:02 PM PST by Former Military Chick
SAN FRANCISCO, Nov. 4 - A year into his job, Mayor Gavin Newsom could hardly be more popular. A survey last weekend put his approval rating among San Franciscans at 80 percent.
Polls show that a mainstay of the Democratic mayor's support has been his stance on same-sex marriage. But with his party reeling from Senator John Kerry's defeat on Tuesday, Mr. Newsom's decision in February to open City Hall to thousands of gay weddings has become a subject of considerable debate among Democrats.
Some in the party were suggesting even before the election that Mr. Newsom had played into President Bush's game plan by inviting a showdown on the divisive same-sex-marriage issue.
Most of the talk has been behind closed doors. But when Senator Dianne Feinstein, a fellow Democrat and Newsom supporter, answered a question about the subject at a news conference outside her San Francisco home on Wednesday, the prickly discussion spilled into the open.
"I believe it did energize a very conservative vote," Ms. Feinstein said of the same-sex marriages here. "I think it gave them a position to rally around. I'm not casting a value judgment. I'm just saying I do believe that's what happened."
"So I think that whole issue has been too much, too fast, too soon,'' she added. "And people aren't ready for it."
Kate Kendell, executive director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights, who was a witness at the first same-sex marriage at San Francisco City Hall, said she received a flurry of angry e-mail messages on Thursday from people upset about Ms. Feinstein's public dressing down of Mr. Newsom.
The topic was also raised with Mr. Newsom himself at a news conference on Wednesday and when he was a guest on a radio talk show here Thursday morning. He said he had no regrets.
Some of his backers were less restrained. In an interview, Ms. Kendell accused Ms. Feinstein of looking for "easy scapegoats."
"Shame on Senator Feinstein and other Democratic leaders for latching to the most facile and shallow of explanations for the results," she said. "What Mayor Newsom did really accelerated the conversation and the movement, and I will never accept an analysis that says a leader who stands for equality and fairness and who has the courage of his convictions is doing the wrong thing."
One openly gay member of Congress, Representative Barney Frank of Massachusetts, disagreed. Mr. Frank was opposed to the San Francisco weddings from the start and told Mr. Newsom as much before the ceremonies began. He urged the mayor to follow the Massachusetts path, which involved winning approval for the marriages in court before issuing licenses.
In a telephone interview on Thursday, Mr. Frank said he felt vindicated by the election results. In Massachusetts, every state legislator on the ballot who supported gay rights won another term. By contrast, constitutional amendments against gay marriage won handily in 11 states - including Ohio, an important battleground - in large part, Mr. Frank said, because of the "spectacle weddings" in San Francisco.
Mr. Frank said Mr. Newsom had helped to galvanize Mr. Bush's conservative supporters in those states by playing into people's fears of same-sex weddings.
Had the Massachusetts approach been followed, he said, "I think there would have been some collateral damage'' in the election, but "a lot less.''
"The thing that agitated people were the mass weddings,'' he said, adding, "It was a mistake in San Francisco compounded by people in Oregon, New Mexico and New York. What it did was provoke a lot of fears."
"He created a sense there was chaos,'' Mr. Frank said of Mr. Newsom, "rather than give us a chance to show, as we have in Massachusetts, that this doesn't mean anything to anyone else."
Some conservative opponents of same-sex marriages concurred. Though the backlash against gay weddings was kick-started by court rulings in Massachusetts - and even earlier in Alaska and Hawaii - opposition resonated with a much broader group of conservatives after Mr. Newsom put San Francisco at the heart of the debate, said Jordan Lorence, a lawyer with the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian group that sued to block the marriages here.
The California Supreme Court eventually declared the 4,000 or so weddings invalid, but the images of same-sex couples' embracing in San Francisco were permanently etched in the public's mind, Mr. Lorence said.
"The court decisions have been the triggers, but Mayor Newsom definitely accelerated the reaction," Mr. Lorence said. "I think we can get 10 or 15 more state constitutional amendments in the 2006 and 2008 election cycle, and maybe even more, because people feel so strongly about this."
In a telephone interview, Mr. Newsom acknowledged that he had taken some heat from fellow Democrats. But he said the criticism was off the mark. Mr. Bush decided to use gay marriage as a political wedge well before the weddings in San Francisco, the mayor said, and the issue had already been politicized by the court rulings in Massachusetts.
Mr. Newsom offered no apologies.
"If you think something is right,'' he said, "you have a moral obligation to act.''
Hope that is OK, cuz, that is what Newsom is. He had no concern for his party, he wanted the lime light now and even better yesterday. He liked that Rosie came to his front steps to marry her signifcant other.
His acts really ticked me off, but, now I am sorta glad he did what he did, arrogant blah blah!!
I'm glad to see they're not bitter.
"Gay marriage" is what flipped a decisive slice of the USA to the GOP, and once the Dems figure it out they will turn on the gays with such savagery you will never have believed it possible.
The Dems were too out of touch. Zell Miller puts it well, a national party no more. They did not listen to him and called him a sell-out.
Unless it has to do with trying to end abortion.
I agree. Gonna be very entertaining and the fags are gonna be silenced, brutally, by thier masters.
We will have to agree to disagree, I think it cost them dearly on voters, who in states where they felt this was being pushed upon them, they were not going to have it.
There were many reasons why the democrats failed to win, but, frankly the numbers were up and when they went to tell their state as voters that they did not support same sex marriage they were also their to vote for the President and from what I have seen they chose Bush. So, something worked in the republican favor.
You do not have to agree, we all have differing opinions and that is what makes FR great, that we can have civil discussions.
Thank you Mr. Newsom, you helped keep Effin, the greatest American Hoax, out of the Presidency! Thanks again!
I guess the Democrats are starting to figure out that morality and traditional values do matter to a great many people in this country after all. They won't learn anything from last Tuesday's debacle. If anything, the Dems will probably be more radical in their agenda.
Cat fight
Hearing the lamentations of the women/girlymen after the blue scum was almost entirely pushed into the sea
Ah but they cannot. The gays have loads (poor choice of words) cash and they shower the Dems with. You think Ted Kennedy or Bill Clinton REALLY like gays? I don't. The just act like they do for the money. The Dems will always have a home for these fairies as long as their cash keeps coming in.
"Gay Marriage did NOT cost the Dims this election."
It certainly fortified those of us who would have crawled on broken glass to the voting booth.
BTTT
Two thoughts...
1. The Man Upstairs works in mysterious ways
and
2. When Feinstein says the people aren't ready for it, she's basically telling us that in her mind some day they will get to have this but we need to take a little at a time. This is what us right-wingers talk about when we say slippery slope.
Santorum was right to defend the Texas laws.
So they still don't get it.
I read an article today in the disgusting St. Petersberg Times. The Demos can't figure out how they lost, they ran "a war hero with a moderate platform". Maybe they need to be more extreme.
Unbelievable.
You do not have to agree, we all have differing opinions and that is what makes FR great, that we can have civil discussions.
I disagree. The Dims confused the issue enough to make it unclear what Kerry's position on Gay Marriage was. They press kept telling us "Sen Kerry opposes Gay Marriage but thinks the states should decide" I doubt many people had any clear idea what Kerry's postion on Gay marriage was. But like you said, we will just have to agree to disagree.
Take the fact that "moral values" was cited by 25% as the most important issue, and that nearly 90% of those voted for Bush, and do the math.
Gay marriage is a symbol of the broader moral and cultural disconnect between the Dems and the general public. GOP civil-union advocates miss this point at the peril of all of us who would suffer under Dem rule...
Michael Savage cited the gay marriage issue as the key to Bush's reelection.
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