Just when you thought it was safe to walk the streets, the beleaguered GOP leadership tells us all that no, there’s yet another crucial issue confronting our country — one that threatens the very moral fabric of our society and will be our undoing if we don’t do something about it right now! (White House)
After more than two centuries of American jurisprudence, and millennia of human experience, a few judges and local authorities are presuming to change the most fundamental institution of civilization. Their actions have created confusion on an issue that requires clarity.
On a matter of such importance, the voice of the people must be heard. Activist courts have left the people with one recourse. If we are to prevent the meaning of marriage from being changed forever, our nation must enact a constitutional amendment to protect marriage in America. Decisive and democratic action is needed, because attempts to redefine marriage in a single state or city could have serious consequences throughout the country.
Sigh…. just what we need about now: yet another divisive display of partisan pandering for its own sake. And here we were all getting along so well, too… cough, gag… (WaPo)
WASHINGTON — President Bush and congressional Republicans are aiming the political spotlight this week on efforts to ban gay marriage, with events at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue _ all for a constitutional amendment with scant chance of passage but wide appeal among social conservatives.
[snip]
But Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., said he will vote against it on the floor but allowed it to survive his panel in part to give the GOP the debate party leaders believe will pay off on Election Day.
By all means, let’s ratchet that empty rhetoric up a bit more for election day, shall we? Just what Polimom likes to see — histrionics and vapors in government to help draw the lines a little more clearly, but done with full knowledge that this is a big waste of time and taxpayer money.
What does this thought process look like? “We just want to get everybody really worked up so they’ll keep us in office…maybe they’ll overlook the shambles we’re creating… thanks so much… ”
In recent years, the radical religious fringe (what an embarrassment to the GOP that they’re considered “the base”) has responded so predictably to these little pokes and prods. Will that fringe care, or even notice, that this is a ploy? Do they understand that this proposed Amendment has no chance of passing, or that the Republican leadership is assuming their constituents will act like Pavlov’s dogs?
Surely you’ve heard of Pavlov? He was the Russian psychologist and physician who brought the world classical conditioning – the behavioral theory that predictable reactions can be produced with consistent stimuli.
Jump, base! Sit, base!
It must be nice to command such respect from one’s leadership.
Joe Gandelman has a much more comprehensive post at TMV, where he wonders whether this cute little maneuver will blow up in the Republican leadership’s faces. Polimom suspects it will.
(X-post from Polimom, Too)