Maine's In The News Today-- Same Sex Marriage Bill Passes The State Senate

A GOP nightmare that would make their demise official

Maine's senior senator, Olympia Snowe is still trying to use Arlen Specter's defection to the other team as a way to hector Republicans into ending their evil ways... a little. After her big OpEd in the NY Times a couple days ago, she sat down with GOP minority leader Miss McConnell and whined that the party of hatred and bigotry should "be more inclusive and responsive and listen to all sides." She warned that if the purists continue to turn the party into a neo-Confederate lunatic asylum they would also turn the GOP's "philosophical tent into an umbrella under which only a select few are worthy to stand."

How many states with two Republican U.S. senators, after all, are headed towards decriminalizing same sex marriage? Oklahoma? Texas? South Carolina? Wymong? Utah? Mississippi? Alabama? None of them; they're all busy looking for more anti-gay constitutional amendments to pass. But yesterday Maine's state Senate voted 21-14 in favor of marriage equality, despite Carrie Prejean's appearance as the new spokesperson for Republican Party bigotry. (Only two Republicans voted with the Democrats in favor of equality.) And the once homophobic governor of Maine, John Baldacci, says he has evolved and changed with time and is now open to signing a same sex marriage bill if it also passes the Maine House (next week).

Opponents said they were surprised at the Senate outcome. They believed they had the votes to kill the bill in its first true legislative test after being voted out of the Legislature's Judiciary Committee with strong support earlier this week.

"A lot of people switched votes at the eleventh hour," said Marc Mutty, public affairs director for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland. "Until this morning, we really thought we had the votes."

Mutty chalked the switches up to politics and suggested that an "unprecedented" volume of phone calls, e-mails and other input persuaded senators to support the bill.

Mutty predicted the House also would pass the measure. He said opponents would now meet to discuss plans for a petition drive to ask voters to overturn it this fall.

"We had hoped to kill this right here and avoid prolonging this through referendum," he said.

...The Senate's vote Thursday fell largely along party lines, with most Democrats supporting the bill and most Republicans opposed. There were some exceptions, however: Sen. Troy Jackson, D-Allagash, voted against the bill, and Sens. Peter Mills, R-Cornville, and Christopher Rector, R-Thomaston, voted to approve.

This morning's Washington Post poses points out that across the country the social wedge issues which the GOP uses to win elections by taking voters' minds off their own economic interests are becoming less and less salient. There is rising support for gay marriage, legalized pot and real immigration reform that includes a pathway for citizenship-- all issues the GOP uses in its campaigns of divisiveness. The hazard for Republicans: "An inability to use those issues to rally their base and appeal to conservative Democrats and independents who previously would have been put off by Democrats' more liberal stances on social issues."

Most striking is the sharp shift in public opinion on same-sex marriage. Forty-nine percent said it should be legal for gay people to marry, and 46 percent said it should be illegal. About three years ago, a broad majority said such unions should be illegal (58 percent illegal to 36 percent legal).

The change is particularly notable given the context in which it is occurring, as several states-- Iowa, Connecticut, New Hampshire and Vermont-- have taken steps in recent weeks to legalize gay marriage. In 2004, a court ruling in Massachusetts legalizing same-sex marriage helped give rise to a slew of anti-gay marriage ballot initiatives around the country that were widely credited with drawing social conservatives to the polls that fall, when former president George W. Bush beat  Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.).

Steve Schmidt, the Republican strategist who managed  John McCain's campaign, recently came out strongly in favor of gay marriage and warned that his party risked being marginalized on the issue.

The poll results back up Schmidt's warnings, as they show shifts in opinion among the swing voters the GOP needs to woo-- independents, white Catholics and the young more broadly. Among independents, there has been a nine-point increase in support for legal gay marriages since 2006, to 52 percent, with strong opposition dropping 10 points over that period.

But among Republicans, about one in five support legal gay marriages, unchanged since 2006.

Schmidt's warnings are also borne out by the shift in opinion on the issue among white Catholic voters, a key swing bloc. In 2006, a third of white Catholics said gay marriage should be legal and 60 percent said it should be illegal. But that has evened out to a 46 percent legal to 47 percent illegal split in the new poll.

Perhaps most troubling for Republican strategists is that the most bigoted voters are the old ones who are closest to death, while those who are most likely to support equality are the youngest voters-- the ones who will be voting long into the future when the typical old line bigots are pushing up daisies. Although even the elderly now support gay marriage more than they used to (28% now support it, up from 15%), among people under 35 the percentage of supporters has jumped dramatically from 53% to 66%. And whereas 21% of Americans are willing to admit being Republicans, only 17% of people under 35 called themselves Republicans. That is one tarnished brand-- even for a party still singling out ethnic groups for discrimination and fighting a bitter civil war.

And Democrats seem far more willing and more able to cope with changing public perceptions on these issues. Recall a few weeks ago we met a former lifelong Republican, Jim Piccillo, who was inspired by Obama to switch parties and is now running against lackluster GOP hack Ginny Brown-Waite in a relatively conservative, rural west Florida district. Piccillo's campaign answered questions today about his stands on issues important to Blue America-- no, he will never join the reactionary Blue Dog Caucus and yes, he "absolutely" supports Employee Free Choice ("The new bill allows for employee empowerment with card check without taking away the secret ballot.  It also mandates that the employer come to contract, in a specific amount of time, or face real penalties, rather than the current ambiguous language and fluff penalties.  A CEO wouldn't want to work a day without a contract; an employee should have that same right."). But even more interesting was the answer to our question about marriage equality. From his campaign manager:

Jim supports equality for all people; regardless of race, sexual orientation or gender.  Yes, he fully supports marriage equality for same sex couples. It is not a cultural issue; it is an equality issue.  All citizens of this county have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  That right should not be judged by others who don't agree with it and aren't even affected by it.