Posted on 08/06/2012 6:59:15 AM PDT by scottjewell
When Democrats announced that their 2012 platform would include a historic first — gay marriage written in as a plank — the reaction from mainstream Republicans was near silence.
There were no statements blasted out from Mitt Romney’s campaign. The same was true for the Republican National Committee. Romney has yet to address the the fact.
The pushback came largely from social conservatives and evangelicals, who pledged to make same-sex unions an issue going forward and insisted the stand will hurt Democrats.
But the comparative quiet from party leaders would have been unimaginable even four years ago, when public opinion hadn’t yet shifted so rapidly on a signature social issue. And it marks a dramatic change among some of the top Republican donors and opinion-makers, who are supporting same-sex marriage in state-based gay legislative and legal fights, even as the official GOP platform will remain centered on traditional marriage.
“Most Republican Party leaders seem to have lost the stomach for this fight,” said Dan Schnur of the Jesse M. Unruh Institute of Politics at the University of Southern California.
(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...
State issue? Why should ANY any part of the government (federal, state or local) have anything to do with marriage? It’s a religious thing, not legal or government.
Thanks for the clarification - yes, let’s hope, and yes, I would agree with you on that.
Yep!
State issue? Why should ANY any part of the government (federal, state or local) have anything to do with marriage? It’s a religious thing, not legal or government.
State issue? Why should ANY any part of the government (federal, state or local) have anything to do with marriage? It’s a religious thing, not legal or government.
That said, though--- and marriage or no marriage --- do you think the govt should renforce child support from fathers? Or should children all be assumed to have no right to parental support, and be dependents of the State? (At present, single-motherhood wedded to the State --- the "Life of Julia" -- seems to be the major alternative.)
I agree - child support is a separate issue - marriage or no marriage - and yes government should have the right to enforce from father - or mother!
But again, the government shouldn’t care whether someone is married or not - it’s just none of their business.
I told my wife months ago that a potted plant could beat Obama in this election but the GOP seemed dead set on nominating the worst possible guy to go against Obama, so Obama might just pull it off. After all, Mitt is a guy who flip flops on every issue, was the grandfather of Obamacare, who pokes the eyes of the conservative base every chance he can, and is a slightly less electrifying speaker than George H W Bush was. They are trying darned hard to lose this thing.
The Republican campaign planks, Domestic, should be jobs and the economy. Period.
The DemocRAT campaign planks are well known > squirel
The rats cannot run on their record. The Republicans need to stick to their campaign.
I guarantee it. In actions.
One could assume the Republican Leadership takes a wide stance on the issue...
This implicitly (sometimes explicitly) underscore's the child's right to derive identity, kinship and provision from his father.
It works well where most births are within wedlock.
It works poorly where most births are not.
That's something that troubles me. From a justice perspective: paternal identification is something the child has a right to. From a civilization perspective: without fatherhood, you have only two alternatives: anarchy, or the omnicompetent State.
And often both: the anarchic omnicompetent State. Which sounds like the path we're on right now: anarchy for the ghetto + the Obamunist "Life of Julia" for the bourgeoisie.
Gay marriage is but a footnote on most people’s list of pressing issues, IMO.
It shouldn’t be so. Unless no one cares about the complete transformation of society which will be detrimental to children.
“I recall that the Catholic Church -— at least in the Kulturkampf fight in the 1870’s -— was against civil marriage.”
That’s because the state, at least in the modern era, determines the definition it uses by whatever judges, pols, or the majority think it is at any one time. Now many are conditioned to think the institution comes from the state as pieces of paper. Also it usurpes the role of one’s faith, just like state involvement with charity and edjumcation. Pope Leo XIII saw it coming 130 years or so ago like you say.
Freegards
Solution: a birth certificate. Have both parents sign it, or not and one abdicates paternal rights (but not responsibility).
The mother's identity is obvious: she signs and she has rights and responsibilities.
Say the father doesn't sign. He doesn't care for any "rights" of paternity. At that point, how does the State enforce the child's right to paternal support?
You have a good pont. However as you stated, being legally ‘married’ is not a valid way to establish legal paternity. I agree that a child has a right to paternal identity, and it is indeed a troubling issue. And I also agree that the government does have a role in establishing ‘fatherhood’, and to some degree, enforcing the responsibilities that go with it.
However, being ‘married’ or ‘unmarried’ does not itself establish paternity with any validity, so it’s a seperate issue.
I still firmly believe that the government has no legitimate reason whatsoever to care whether a person is married or not, and it follows that nor shall it care to whom one is married. If a person wants to declare that they’re married to a fencepost, why should the government intercede?
I'm trying to work up a 6-lesson course to be offered in my parish, tentatively titled:
The woman identifies him in a potential civil action and a Court required to provide a DNA sample. If she's right, he pays for both the test and whatever support is determined in Court. If she's wrong then she pays for the test and begins the long, tough, road of single motherhood - actions have consequences.
Either way, their state of marriage, being single, or perhaps marital infidelity, is irrelevant to The State.
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