The Decider decides to divide

“It actually -- what we're really talking about here is an attempt to try to maintain the traditional meaning of an institution that has maintained one meeting for -- meaning for a period of centuries. And furthermore –“

Thus spake Bush’s press secretary Tony Snow yesterday, or stuttered or stumbled if you prefer. I can’t blame him, since it’s not easy to be the mouthpiece for that shifty, inarticulate, would-be demagogue who calls himself the decider.

Just exactly why nobody has challenged the premise that traditions of long standing need to be “honored in the law” and justified by their antiquity, I do not know, but perhaps the answer is obvious enough even to the professional scribblers that it wasn’t worth the asking. If this had been the practice when our constitution was written; if things can be justified by tradition, we would have retained a monarch. Of course some expect that to be the decider’s next proposition – right after the amendment that cites the Christian Bible as the ultimate source of law. ( Hebrew Bible commandments may selectively be ignored, but must be written on courthouse walls anyway.)

Protecting a somewhat tendentious biblical interpretation is at heart what Bush’s Marriage Amendment is about. King David after all, who was also the anointed son (meschiach or Christos, if you’re Greek) had more wives than Bush has supporters and as I interpret it, had a boy toy as well.

“I don't think it's posturing. I mean, I think many of us in this room are married, and we have strong feelings about the importance of marriage in our lives. And I think having the ability to define marriage is something that's important to a great many people in the United States of America.”

Well I agree, and it’s so important that I don’t want the Federal Government making it for me. I want to decide that for myself and therefore need to allow everyone else to decide for himself. It’s about freedom: it’s about life liberty and the pursuit of happiness, not about moral dictatorship or State authorized religious codes. I also agree with Snow that it’s a civil rights issue, although he couldn’t explain exactly why blocking civil rights was necessary, or why the two gay guys who live down the road from me are weakening my marriage, or why the only consistent pattern of decisions the Decider has made are to interfere with the private lives of citizens. Perhaps if I had Snow’s job I would be stammering too.