PAINTING HIMSELF INTO A CORNER

Andrew Sullivan rages at Bush on the gay issue, but he's not too impressed with Kerry either.

So assume that Kerry is elected president this November. Now fast forward to November 2006. In Massachusetts, the one state where our equality now exists, there will be a referendum on an amendment to the state constitution. The referendum proposes that marriage rights be removed from gay couples and replaced with "civil unions," institutions that grant all the same rights as marriage - in so far as the state can bestow them. And Kerry is publicly in support of that amendment. And he is from Massachusetts. And he is president. Connect the dots: He could be critical in taking away civil rights in the one state where we now have them. And, by his obvious comfort with gay people, he would help to legitimize the notion that it's ok to shepherd us into the "separate but equal" category of civil unions. The Human Rights Campaign, long leery of supporting marriage rights, will likely give him cover. So will many gay Democrats.

The trouble, Andrew, is that we live in a majoritarian democracy, and a majority of people do not support gay marriage. So politicians tack towards the center, and in this case, the "center" is just not where you want it to be. It's not surprising that a majority of people do not support gay marriage, since this has been the case throughout human history. Can you accept that?