Democratic Sen. Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts, the only state that has legalized gay marriage, said the Republican leadership “is asking us to spend time writing bigotry into the Constitution. A vote for it is a vote against civil unions, against domestic partnership, against all other efforts for states to treat gays and lesbians fairly under the law.”
In response, Hatch said: “Does he really want to suggest that over half of the United States Senate is a crew of bigots?” (from the Washington Post)
I don’t know if Kennedy “really wants to suggest” that, but I’d be willing to suggest that almost half of the United States Senate is willing to pander to bigots. As a matter of fact, I think they suggested it themselves by even bringing this to the floor. The motion to end debate was 49-48 — 11 votes short of what was needed to move to an “up or down” vote. I was pleased to see that Specter voted against it.
But that’s all normal election year politics. Here’s something which might actually be worse. In Ohio, the infamous Kenneth Blackwell (the guy who, in 2004, “instructed county boards of elections to reject any registrations on paper of less than 80-pound stock”) is underfire for implementing rules that appear to have hindering voter registration as their goal. It’s hard to say if this is just him, or if the legislature passed a stupid law, but as the NY Times points out, Blackwell is running for governor, and “Mr. Blackwell should hand over responsibility for elections to a decision maker whose only loyalty is to the voters and the law.”
I also doubt Kennedy “really wants to suggest over half of the United States Senate is a crew of bigots” (and you’re a little optimistic Orrin, as you didn’t even get a simple majority), but that’s a fair interpretation of the situation. Fortunately, in terms of election-year politics, the gay marriage issue — or the “gay panic button,” as Jacob Weisberg calls it in his Slate piece — probably isn’t going to work for Republicans the way it did in 2004. Weisberg gives three reasons, and I’ll give you another: Republicans are so far behind in the polls and their base is so disillusioned and their problems are so fundamental that whatever bump they might get from the issue won’t win them the day.
As far as the vote tampering thing, I take all of those stories with a grain of salt, mostly because I think both sides are engaging in different tactics that balance each other out and generally don’t do much to affect overall outcomes. That’s not to say I condone the use of such tactics. Perhaps the real concern is that only slightly more than half of eligible voters are voting in presidential election years and that less than 40% are voting in off years. Not that I’m necessarily endorsing it, but I truly wonder what sort of election results we’d have if voting were compulsory, as it is in some nations. Maybe we’d find out what the “will of the people” actually is.