The President's Sidestep

The above is a great little song when you are thinking about politicians.  They all are great at doing a sidestep.  Mr. Obama in particular.  His "evolving" on marriage equality and saying that it is something that needs to decided by the states is just plain and simple a cop out.  Marriage is not something that can or should be decided by the states or by religious bigots.  There are real benefits for those folks who want to be married including the rights of survivor ship and the ability to be with your loved one as they lay dying.  The horror stories that I have read about people who have been in long term committed relationships and yet were not allowed to be with their partner as they needed them most when they were dying and needed the comfort of the person they loved the most need to be addressed.

Just today I read of a man who's partner had died and he wrote up the obituary for the newspaper.  All reference to him was edited out by the paper.  They had been together in a loving committed relationship for 17  years and the newspaper because of its bigoted attitudes was allowed to stick the knife in the open wound and twist it.

Mr. President you are doing a little sidestep. And it shows when you talk about it on your face. You can't take care of this problem state by state any more than it could be done state by state when blacks and whites were finally allowed to marry.  Some rights are too important to be voted on or to be denied because bigots fight against it.  Most of those against it are against marriage equality because they cannot understand how two people of the same sex can love each other.  Well they can.  My friends here in Ames who married when the Judges of the Iowa Supreme Court unanimously and courageously said it was a constitutional right for them to marry.  They have a right to be married in Iowa and I for one am proud to live in a state that recognizes that.

There are some rights that are just fundamental and right and should not be left up to the states.  Mr. Obama's position is probably due to an "ick" factor within him that was put there when he was a youngster.  He does need to evolve.  He needs to evolve out of a bigoted stance on this issue and recognize that this is a large enough issue that it needs to be a national right not something handed out piecemeal state to state.  Stop the side-stepping and step up to the plate.. But then I guess I knew what kind of a president you would be when you invited Rick Warren to pray at your inauguration.  I will probably vote for you next time but that is because the alternative is too awful to contemplate. But I would switch to someone else with more courage if it were practical (as long as they weren't Republithug)