I think they could possibly "pretend" but avoid lying by saying something along the lines of "I've talked to plenty of people on the main streets and back roads of this district, and they believe that marriage should be preserved between a man and a woman, and I will take that message to the Congress."

They are politicians, after all. If they can't avoid stating directly a perhaps unpopular personal belief on this issue, maybe they should look for another line of work. They can simply take the list of GOP responses to TPM readers on Social Security phase-out and adapt it to gay marriage.

Also, given what Matt says, no wonder Dems can't get past this issue. This basically validates voters' concerns about Dems on the issue and makes them look wishy-washy and hypocritical, which journalists are going to pick up on and write about.

Lying is always bad advice.

Opposed to this issue?
Change parties and stay an honestly labeled liar.
Don't sully the Dem party with lying, let Rove have that tactic.

Matt knocks another one into the cesspool by trying to be hip.

This reminds me of the Libertarian Party member who said, "If lying helps, I say lie."

I understand Matt's point - if you're going to lie, do it well. But it's a stupid point to make in the context of political campaigning - no matter how "realistic" it might seem.

Any of those Democrats hanging out in back rooms with journalists want to stand up and be real leaders?

I didn't think so.

I hope to see more awareness of how "gay marriage" has been used to influence people to vote against their own interests across a spectrum of other issues, focusing on who we sleep with rather than whether we have a job when we get up, or whether our economic future continues to be hog-slop in Haliburton's feeding trough, while the constitutional rights won and guarded over generations are stolen to empower an executive branch that breeds terrorists and waves flags to distract us from the pillaging of our future.

Here's a good way to split the haisr on the sisue:

"I oppose gay marraige but favor civil unions provided they are enacted by vote not imposed by judges."
Thats' pretty much where most of the country is (even Bush tiptoed in that direction just before the 2004 election) and while it wonlt win votes from the hardcore Religious Rrght, it probably won't ciost votes from anyone whose vote might be in play on other issues.

Actually, they all stood up before they sat down. 

Hoppy in Sacramento

Gay marriage is not just a political issue. It is, or should be, a moral issue for those on both sides of the debate.

 I see little difference, for example, between saying that "marriage is between a man and a woman" and saying "marriage is between white people." I think that bans on gay marriage are a moral blot on our society.

So I agree with Carville that Democrats who really believe that "marriage is between a man and woman" should say so (that way I'll know who to vote against in the primary).

But if you're not lucky enough to be able to regurgitate casuistry with any degree of conviction, then it is in an obligation of conscience to let the public know where you stand.

To be defeated for taking a stand on behalf of basic human rights is not shameful. And defeat is not inevitable.

Ovid

Leave it to Kant to try to legislate moral imperatives, which by definition emanate from the individual. Only I can judge what I am morally bound to do.

But your examples WERE enacted by vote.

Your first and third examples-- integration (and by that you mean racial integration of state facilities) and mixed race marriages are rights protected under the 14th Amendment. The second examples was voted in with the 19th Amendment (as you know, amendments are voted in by supermajorities of both Houses and the state legislatures).

Of course it took a 100 years before the Supreme Court to start enforcing the 14th amendment to protect African-Americans, but the Brown and Love decisions were simply the Court accepting what the voters had enacted during Reconstruction.

As for the 19th Amendment, I don't think any judge tried blocking the popular will and chicks have been voting ever since.

Point taken. 

Have questions about the Cafe? Try here.

Most red staters I meet in North Carolina have a libertarian problem with this issue. They hate "fags," but don't want the federal government snooping and/or legislating what they perceive a state's rights issue. That said, any Democrat currying favor with bigots is a disgrace to the party and will not see my donation to their campaign. I would hope more readers here will agree--there are better people who deserve our $50.

Hope you're not a Dem campaigning for office in a Red State.

Unfortunately, I'm afraid that that's the recipe for a minority party, no matter how convincing you think it would be. Convincing bigots that they are wrong and working to create a majority in favor of gay marriage is the job of activists and supporters of that position. Getting elected is the job of Democratic candidates.

Kerry didn't endorse the anti-gay marriage ballot initiatives like Bill Clinton recommended, did he?

Change parties? Are you implying that supporting gay marriage is now the official Democratic position? News to me. News to a lot of people, I think.

when you are trying to get a bigot or a homophobe to vote for a liberal candidate you bet your bottom bippie the candidate MUST lie to the homophobe. Let's get clear about one thing. The first duty of a reformer is to get elected and if he has to fib the homophobe (racist, sexist...etc) into thinking he is with them he SHOULD.
I would say it is his DUTY to fool the homophobe.

Sorry for having to be so blunt about this but being against same sex marriage is basically a bigoted position -- doesn't matter if it's motivated by religion or not.

A position isn't moral just because it's inspired by some sort of religious belief.

thosethingswesay.blogspot.com

I think the implication was the party of liars, not gay marriage.

That said, Dems are the only here, aren't they? 

Have questions about the Cafe? Try here.

We don't have to look far to see where the Dems have gotten their reputation for waffling and flip-flopping.  Just look at the statement, "I believe marriage is between a man and a woman."

Why not simply say, "I oppose gay marriage"?  Doesn't it come to the same thing?  It's hard to talk plain English, though, when you're saying something you don't really believe.  It makes the lie all the more uncomfortable.

Ovid

Kant was NOT wrong, young man, you ARE! And shame on you for suggesting lies are an acceptable option. One need not mislead either, as that is no different from lying. What your mother told you, "If you can't say anything nice...," also applies to this case. Holding ones opinions to oneself is an option, and following the ethical path might require nothing be said. There is no shame in that, while lies and deceit are shameful in themselves.

Aren't you wearied to the point of anger over the lies of the current band of thugs in D.C? Check your values to suggest that which you dispise from others, you encourage in those whom you support.

I like totally convincingly. Like, Matt's is a great post. Trust me.

John 

http://www.haberarts.com/

I am old enough to remember very well how Ike and JFK respected the feelings of the voters and did nothing to end racial segregation.  If someone wants to be called a leader they have to be willing to lead.  That means persuading the voters to change their minds and accept what you know is right.  We are in that situation in regards to same sex marriage now.  So, our leaders need to lead. 

Hoppy in Sacramento

That is not so because it does not lead to a destruction of the social agreement that is society. Which is why those other things are prohibited.

Well remember what LBJ's stand eventually did--it brought the current Bush regime into power.

Although that does present an interesting question: would I prefer to drink from a seperate water fountain, keep out of certain parts of town and suffer occasional beatings or Bush in power?

Dicey.

That's a tricky path, but perhaps the most rewarding: "Look, I'm not personally involved. I never considered this a real issue, not like the budget, or Iraq. It's your pocketbook I'm worried about, your sons and daughters fighting overseas, not about if Jane and Mary want to call themselves wife and wife."

I personally think Democrats need to emphasize the seperation of church and state, that only a church can decide who gets married in their chapel. Make the Republicans look dishonest.

I agree with this wholeheartedly. John Locke, writing on Toleration, suggests that both rewards and punishments concerning matters of belief are impossible tools for creating change. What these techniques do is create liars. Offer me a million dollars to believe in the tooth fairy I'll tell you I believe in the tooth fairy. (Actually, it would take ten million).

Mike

It's disappointing to me that no one outside of libertarian circles is discussing a position that I believe to be both tactically shrewd and impeccably principled. On a personal note, it's also the only way I've found to reconcile my deep moral beliefs (that same-sex unions are an affront to the divinely-created institution of marriage) and my political ones (that government has no business giving my moral beliefs preference over other people's).

Why does there need to be civil marriage as such at all? Why not afford all Americans equal rights via civil unions? (Really, why even favor unioned versus non-unioned Americans instead of giving equal rights to all?) Why can't a deeply principled, pro-equal-right Democrat running in an equally deeply principled, pro-traditional marriage constituency, take this position to her advantage?

I'm don't consider myself part of the Religious Right, but I have enough contact with those circles to have a vague sense what makes this issue so polarizing. Perhaps for some it's just out-and-out hatred for the Other, but those aren't voters a Democratic candidate is going to be vying for. I believe that more of the Religious Right -- a group whose heterogeneity is not adequately appreciated, by the way -- don't wish ill upon gay people but have a fear that a self-styled cultural elite are attempting to push an agenda upon them. Well-founded or not, that's certainly the message that Rove et al. want to get out at election time. So wouldn't the libertarian solution blunt this? "We're not trying to coerce you to recognize gay marriages. But we believe deeply for equal rights for all Americans. The definition of a marriage can be left up to your church."

Why indeed need government be in the marriage business?

I doubt that every voter is a single issue voter. The problem with a discussion like this one is that it assumes that an issue like gay marriage is so pivotal that taking the wrong position on it is going to cost the party/interest/individual the election. There is always less agreement on what the pivotal issue is than there is on the existence of one.

Then, there seems to be a sense that if I don't reach and convert every one of "them" (whomever the them are), I'm going to lose. Yet many elections are settled by relatively narrow margins, and the real object of the campaign is to pick off as many of them without losing too many of us in the process.

No matter what one does, one will not convert aggressively homophobic voters to accept candidates which support, or even have an open mind about, gay marriage. But every person with doubts about gay marriage isn't aggressively homophobic. So what do I do about those?

I think a three-pronged approach might be best.

Some of those opposing gay marriage can be convinced by argument that gay marriage is no threat to them or to family values. This is probably best done through retail politics one on one, commencing with people one knows.

The second approach would be to remind persons opposed to gay marriage that they have other areas of vital interest to them as well. I suspect all of us have at some time or other held our noses and voted for someone even though there was passionate disagreement on one or another position. (I wish more of the persons who voted for Nader in 2004 had held their noses and voted for Kerry, but that's history now).

The third approach would be to remind people that being morally (or economically, or environmentally) opposed to one candidate does not of necessity mean that one has to vote for the other. We allow legislators to abstain, and we can encourage persons to cast blank ballots if they can't make a choice which is morally comfortable for them. Not voting for X is almost as good as voting for Y. I had an uncle who found bothDewey and Truman to liberal for him in the 1948 election. He wrote in the name of Norman Thomas Go figure. I leave it to those who are too young to remember to Google Thomas see the irony in that.

I think a combination of persuading the persuadable, reaching out to those who will vote despite, and reminding the rest that not voting (or voting for a protest candidate) will attract enough of "them" without alienating too many of "us," to win some close elections without violating principles or developing a reputation for hypocrisy.

Mike

Actually Kerry DID endorse a hate amendment in Massachusets. (And a lot of good it did him!)

Well, Republicans are always going to win any vote Demcrats are willing to admit is a hate vote. Not quite the same thing...

Look, the pragmatic problem with "just lie about it", is that people who disagree with you aren't necessarilly idiots, and they aren't necessarilly incapable of researching what you used to say. So they're going to notice that you're now lying, and hold that against you in addition to the position you're lying about.

Besides, the moment you decide to lie about your position, you lose all oportunity to change anybody's mind in your direction. (Hell, you might even lie so convincingly that you win converts for the OTHER side...)

Lying is generally a really bad idea. In candidates for office, it's not just a bad idea, it's a positive affront to democracy, because it represents an effort to obtain votes under false pretenses.

yes, but many...as you noted due to religious beliefs, would argue that gay marriage does.

 There are a few valid reasons for government to be in the marriage business.  One is that the income tax code gives advantages to being married that it doesn't give to those who are not married.  Another is that inheritance is governed by laws.  A third is that adoption is regulated by government. Etc.

If we eliminate the favored treatment given to married folks across the board, then it makes no difference if the government recognizes gay marriage, or any other marriage. 

Hoppy in Sacramento

Maybe you are a first-time candidate for office and haven't taken a position before.

Under my prescriptions, you basically duck, rep your district, and wait for the activists to change the tide or at least get close (basic recipe for other civil rights battles).

If you care deeply about this issue, start working to change public opinion! Issuing purity tests for Dems is not going to help your case in either the short or long run. You'll get some more Alitos and Roberts and constitutional amendment supporters.

Anyway, it's exactly what the GOP is doing on Social Security. Duck and hope no one figures out that you want phase out.

Like I said, recipe for a minority party. Way too idealistic.

But those are privileges that just happen to be part of what civil society has called marriage. The word is largely arbitrary, isn't it?

I grant that the adoption issue is going to be thorny and cause divisions regardless, but that has little to do with the designation marriage. You could say that adoption rights depend on "civil unions", which would be the highest form of union the government recognizes, and there would still be controversy on that particular issue.

I would say that, if being honest with the voters about what you want is a "recipe for a permanent minority", then you ought to be a permanent minority.

Convince the public to agree with you, or lose. Getting people to vote for you by lying about what you'll do if elected is just as much ballot fraud as stuffing the ballot box.

Re: Pretend to believe that every Jewish law laid out 3000 years ago in Leviticus is still relevant.

Red herring alert!
I am not aware of any Christian church, not even among the thumpiest of Bible-thumpers, which holds to the above. If you know of some church where men have to be circumicized to join and which sponsors a Kosher Police please let us know.