Republican Wedge Issues, Part I

Looks like those antigay amendments aren't as popular when you hit the coast:

One of two groups competing to put a gay marriage ban before California voters in 2006 has bowed out of the fight for now, saying the timing and political climate are not right to get such a measure passed.

Tuesday was the deadline for ProtectMarriage.com to submit the signatures needed to qualify for the June primary ballot one of two overlapping initiatives that would outlaw same-sex marriage and restrict domestic partnership rights.

Andrew Pugno, the group's legal adviser, said the signature drive had fallen about 200,000 voters short of the requirement for 591,105 signatures.

I think one reason this failed to gain any traction is that it's been two years since the brouhaha about protecting traditional marriage, and the much-ballyhooed breakdown and chaos simply hasn't happened. Massachusetts has the only true gay marriage rights in the country and, not paradoxically, the lowest divorce rate. Married couples have more to worry about understanding and communicating with each OTHER rather than fearing the great scourge of gay people in their midst. I oughta know - the dissolution of my marriage, I can attest with near-100% certainty, had nothing to do with the "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" folks.

As Martin Luther King said, "the long arc of history bends toward justice." Eventually anti-gay marriage laws will be as much of a sad relic of the past as anti-miscegenation laws. That they couldn't even get a marriage amendment on the ballot in California suggests that the tide may be turning.