What’s really going on in Massachusetts with the anti-gay right dropping support for the 2006 vote on the anti-marriage equality constitutional amendment in favor of a new 2008 referendum? A reader offers an explanation:
The decision of anti-marriage equality forces in Massachusetts to forego a compromise constitutional amendment (that would create civil unions) set to be voted on in 2006 and instead work for another amendment to be voted on in 2008 that would ban same sex marriage (and not create civil unions) should be seen in the light of Governor Mitt Romney’s Presidential ambitions (and his likely decision, I think, not to run for re-election at home). To appeal to the out-of state Republican right, Romny has moved far to the right in the past several months in terms of abortion and stem cell research. He has visted red states projecting an anti-Massachusetts Liberal image for himself. He seems now more opposed to civil unions. Not surprisingly, his local poll numbers have accordingly dropped. The proposed amendment in 2006 would be a political nightmare for Romney. If the 2006 amendment were to pass, Massachusetts would constitutionally create civil unions on his watch. If the 2006 amendment were to fail, which looks increasingly likely, Massachusetts would have voted for gay marriage on his watch. Either way, it would be a hard sell to the right wing Republican base. He would look weak or too liberal. Romney is far better off to back a clear cut ban without civil unions that couldn’t be voted on until 2008. That way he doesn’t have to live with the consequences of 2006 and he can maintain he was always opposed to both gay marriage and civil unions.
It makes more sense now.
EMAIL OF THE DAY: “Recently I had lunch with someone who at some point during his seminary studies was in a chaplaincy-training program in the Navy. He has been out of the country for some time and was unaware of the scandal at the Air Force Academy. His response was that from his experience there is a similar problem in the Navy and his comments about some of the chaplains candidates were less than reassuring. What he did say is that it is his impression that some in the Naval chaplaincy are aware of the problem and would like to try and rectify the situation. His memory of the reaction of some of the candidates to the workshops on pluralism, etc. was far from positive. His feeling was that some of them “just didn’t get it”.
Thinking about his comments later I realized that the larger problem, one which is far more sensitive and problematic, is the nature of much of Evangelical Protestantism, at least here in the US. Many of them make no bones about their mission of aggressive evangelizing among Catholics, Jews, etc. Our conversation reminded me of the comments from another former chaplain-candidate, now a rabbi, who said that during his training (in the Air Force) one of the Protestant candidates said that he was upset that such a nice person would still be going to hell because he hasn’t accepted Jesus Christ as his savior (this is more or less what I remember him recalling). As if our Armed Forces don’t have their hands full with immediate issues of life and death.”
The Dish 