The Only True Way To Save Marriage From Obama

The Only True Way To Save Marriage From Obama

For honoring his conscience on the issue of marriage equality, President Obama earned angry rebukes from all quarters on the right, including the Uncle Toms of the Log Cabin Republicans, who said he was “a day late and a dollar short”; teenage mom Bristol Palin, who mocked him for invoking his daughters in changing “thousands of years of thinking about marriage”; and 50 year-old virgin Ann Coulter, often engaged but never wed, who called his decision “a sign of desperation.”

On the Fox Nation website, minions of Roger Ailes accused Obama of declaring “war on marriage,” echoing Rush Limbaugh‘s charge that “the president of the United States is going to lead a war on traditional marriage,” while Karl Rove simply gloated that the controversy has left him “in a bad place” with Catholic and conservative voters.

All of these reflexive attacks were consistent with Republican propaganda shrieking that matrimonial rights for gay people will destroy the institution they hope to uphold. It is a puzzling argument, especially because the principal right-wing complaint against homosexuals for so many years was their alleged promiscuity. Now gays and lesbians are charged with trying to ruin the family because they want to take vows of fidelity.

In this historic moment for human rights, listening to the likes of Ailes (now on his third marriage) and Limbaugh (currently married to wife number four), not to mention Rove (divorced twice), it is impossible to believe that Republicans screaming about the future of wedlock are sincere. If they are truly worried about marriage, they should stop harassing gays and campaign for the only change that might make a real difference.

They could outlaw divorce, or least repeal the ultra-liberal, no-fault divorce laws that they’ve used to their own advantage.

Across America — and particularly in the red states that have rejected gay marriage — divorce rates are continually rising, along with teen pregnancies, out-of-wedlock births, and single motherhood (which somehow afflict  gay-friendly blue states far less). Gay rights obviously isn’t the cause of marital strife and separation in those places where hostility to same-sex relationships is considered a religious duty. To achieve their professed goal of protecting marriage, shouldn’t the divorce addicts of the Republican right renounce their sins and return to the teachings of Jesus Christ and the Old Testament, which forbid divorce except under a few very restricted circumstances?

Of course such a return to bygone moral standards would severely inconvenience for men like the hypocrites named above — along with Rupert Murdoch,Newt Gingrich, and a very large proportion of the GOP Congressional caucus — and will therefore never occur. Restricting divorce wouldn’t be  good social policy anyway. Yet it is worth noting that the most enraged defenders of the traditional, heterosexual conjugal bond are men who have repeatedly trashed their own marriages.

Why should Limbaugh and his ilk deny gays and lesbians a chance at wedded bliss? Can they possibly set a worse example, after all, than he did?

 

Start your day with National Memo Newsletter

Know first.

The opinions that matter. Delivered to your inbox every morning

President Biden Signs Spending Bill To Avert Shutdown, Urges Ukraine Aid
President Joe Biden with First Lady Jill Biden as he signs gun and school safety legislation

WASHINGTON, March 23 (Reuters) - President Joe Biden on Saturday signed into law a $1.2 trillion spending package, keeping the U.S. government funded through a fiscal year that began six months ago.Biden described the package, which Congress overwhelmingly passed in the early hours of Saturday, as investing in Americans as well as strengthening the economy and national security. The Democratic president urged Congress to pass other bills stuck in the legislative chambers.

Keep reading...Show less
January 6 riot

Police munitions explode as Trump supporters riot at US Capitol on January 6, 2021

Photo by Leah Millis/REUTERS

It may come as a surprise to hear that I actually agree with Donald Trump on something: America does have a two-tiered system of justice. In fact, you could say I beat him to it since I reached that conclusion long before the former president adopted it as his mantra.

Keep reading...Show less
{{ post.roar_specific_data.api_data.analytics }}