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"Marriage Equality Is a Conservative Cause"

Started by Berkut, February 21, 2013, 02:34:59 PM

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Berkut

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/marriage-equality-is-a-conservative-cause485/

Quote
The party of Theodore Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan has now lost the popular vote in five of the last six presidential elections. The marketplace of ideas will render us irrelevant, and soon, if we are not honest about our time and place in history. Unfortunately, much of the discussion has focused on cosmetic solutions to, say, our underperformance among ethnic and young voters. This is a mistake: we cannot cross this river by feeling for stones. Instead, we need to take a hard look at what today's conservatism stands for.
Conservatives can start by examining how Republicans working with Democrats have governed in several successful states, including Utah; free-market-based healthcare reform, tax reform that eliminated deductions and closed loopholes to bring down rates, and practical education reforms that spoke to 21st-century realities.

Instead of using immigration reform as a wedge issue, like many leaders in Washington, Utah passed legislation to help manage immigration based on our real economic needs. If conservatives come to the table with solutions that put our communities first, it will go a long way toward winning elections.
But it's difficult to get people even to consider your reform ideas if they think, with good reason, you don't like or respect them. Building a winning coalition to tackle the looming fiscal and trust deficits will be impossible if we continue to alienate broad segments of the population. We must be happy warriors who refuse to tolerate those who want Hispanic votes but not Hispanic neighbors. We should applaud states that lead on reforming drug policy. And, consistent with the Republican Party's origins, we must demand equality under the law for all Americans.

While serving as governor of Utah, I pushed for civil unions and expanded reciprocal benefits for gay citizens. I did so not because of political pressure—indeed, at the time 70 percent of Utahns were opposed—but because as governor my role was to work for everybody, even those who didn't have access to a powerful lobby. Civil unions, I believed, were a practical step that would bring all citizens more fully into the fabric of a state they already were—and always had been—a part of.
That was four years ago. Today we have an opportunity to do more: conservatives should start to lead again and push their states to join the nine others that allow all their citizens to marry. I've been married for 29 years. My marriage has been the greatest joy of my life. There is nothing conservative about denying other Americans the ability to forge that same relationship with the person they love.

All Americans should be treated equally by the law, whether they marry in a church, another religious institution, or a town hall. This does not mean that any religious group would be forced by the state to recognize relationships that run counter to their conscience. Civil equality is compatible with, and indeed promotes, freedom of conscience.
Marriage is not an issue that people rationalize through the abstract lens of the law; rather it is something understood emotionally through one's own experience with family, neighbors, and friends. The party of Lincoln should stand with our best tradition of equality and support full civil marriage for all Americans.

This is both the right thing to do and will better allow us to confront the real choice our country is facing: a choice between the Founders' vision of a limited government that empowers free markets, with a level playing field giving opportunity to all, and a world of crony capitalism and rent-seeking by the most powerful economic interests.
Adam Smith was not only an architect of the modern world of extraordinary economic opportunity, he was a moralist whose first book was The Theory of Moral Sentiments. The foundation of his thought was his insight that free markets and open commerce strengthened our moral fiber by reinforcing the community of shared and reciprocal economic interests. Government, he thought, had to be limited lest it be captured and corrupted by special business interests who wanted protection from competition and the reciprocal requirements of community.

We are at a crossroads. I believe the American people will vote for free markets under equal rules of the game—because there is no opportunity or job growth any other way. But the American people will not hear us out if we stand against their friends, family, and individual liberty.


I simply do not understand how Huntsman was never a serious candidate, when teakazoids like Gingrich were.
Maybe I am just that disconnected from the modern Republican Party - and Huntsman is as well.
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Caliga

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garbon

Malt, what happens when Berk starts a pointless "gay" thread?
"I've never been quite sure what the point of a eunuch is, if truth be told. It seems to me they're only men with the useful bits cut off."
I drank because I wanted to drown my sorrows, but now the damned things have learned to swim.

Admiral Yi

Quote from: garbon on February 21, 2013, 02:38:05 PM
Malt, what happens when Berk starts a pointless "gay" thread?

It's not a gay thread.  It's a "GOP out of touch" thread.

Viking

Quote from: Caliga on February 21, 2013, 02:36:23 PM
I would have voted for Huntsman. :yes: :(

He was also the guy who had the right positions on global warming and evolution (both are happening and are real)
First Maxim - "There are only two amounts, too few and enough."
First Corollary - "You cannot have too many soldiers, only too few supplies."
Second Maxim - "Be willing to exchange a bad idea for a good one."
Second Corollary - "You can only be wrong or agree with me."

A terrorist which starts a slaughter quoting Locke, Burke and Mill has completely missed the point.
The fact remains that the only person or group to applaud the Norway massacre are random Islamists.

Caliga

What's weird to me is that many conservative Christians I've spoken with actually believe in evolution (though inevitably they say God guided it) and global warming.  So I'm not sure why GOP politicians trying to shore up the hardcore fundamentalist base are REQUIRED to pretend that they don't believe in either one of them. :hmm:
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DGuller

Quote from: Berkut on February 21, 2013, 02:34:59 PM
I simply do not understand how Huntsman was never a serious candidate, when teakazoids like Gingrich were.
I do.  The GOP electorate has been continuously whipped into insanity for close to two decades now.  It's not surprising that after that extensive conditioning they choose to go for crazy candidates with crazy ideas.

Barrister

Quote from: Berkut on February 21, 2013, 02:34:59 PM
I simply do not understand how Huntsman was never a serious candidate, when teakazoids like Gingrich were.
Maybe I am just that disconnected from the modern Republican Party - and Huntsman is as well.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall that Huntsman hadn't raised any significant amount of money, which of course is the mothers milk of politics...
Posts here are my own private opinions.  I do not speak for my employer.

Caliga

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derspiess

Quote from: Barrister on February 21, 2013, 02:52:35 PM
Quote from: Berkut on February 21, 2013, 02:34:59 PM
I simply do not understand how Huntsman was never a serious candidate, when teakazoids like Gingrich were.
Maybe I am just that disconnected from the modern Republican Party - and Huntsman is as well.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall that Huntsman hadn't raised any significant amount of money, which of course is the mothers milk of politics...

Along with the fact that he didn't resonate with the GOP base.
"If you can play a guitar and harmonica at the same time, like Bob Dylan or Neil Young, you're a genius. But make that extra bit of effort and strap some cymbals to your knees, suddenly people want to get the hell away from you."  --Rich Hall

Eddie Teach

Quote from: Viking on February 21, 2013, 02:42:40 PM
Quote from: Caliga on February 21, 2013, 02:36:23 PM
I would have voted for Huntsman. :yes: :(

He was also the guy who had the right positions on global warming and evolution (both are happening and are real)

Why the fuck would it matter what someone's position on evolution is?  :wacko:
To sleep, perchance to dream. But in that sleep of death, what dreams may come?

DGuller

Quote from: derspiess on February 21, 2013, 02:57:07 PM
Along with the fact that he didn't resonate with the GOP base.
I already said that.  :mad:

Barrister

Quote from: derspiess on February 21, 2013, 02:57:07 PM
Quote from: Barrister on February 21, 2013, 02:52:35 PM
Quote from: Berkut on February 21, 2013, 02:34:59 PM
I simply do not understand how Huntsman was never a serious candidate, when teakazoids like Gingrich were.
Maybe I am just that disconnected from the modern Republican Party - and Huntsman is as well.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall that Huntsman hadn't raised any significant amount of money, which of course is the mothers milk of politics...

Along with the fact that he didn't resonate with the GOP base.

He never had a chance to resonate with anyone if he had no money.
Posts here are my own private opinions.  I do not speak for my employer.

derspiess

Quote from: DGuller on February 21, 2013, 03:01:40 PM
Quote from: derspiess on February 21, 2013, 02:57:07 PM
Along with the fact that he didn't resonate with the GOP base.
I already said that.  :mad:

Not exactly.  Was worth saying again in any case.
"If you can play a guitar and harmonica at the same time, like Bob Dylan or Neil Young, you're a genius. But make that extra bit of effort and strap some cymbals to your knees, suddenly people want to get the hell away from you."  --Rich Hall

Maximus

Quote from: derspiess on February 21, 2013, 02:57:07 PM
Along with the fact that he didn't resonate with the GOP base.
Isn't the issue that the GOP base is insufficient?