When last we looked in on this particular Republican presidential candidate and his repeated stumbles on the issue of sodomarriage, he was trying to appease the commumedia complex by saying that of course, he'd attend a gay "wedding," thinking that would earn him "brown"ie points and media street cred - which it didn't. Then, seeing that his initial bending over and grabbing of the ankles hadn't worked, a few days later he doubled down by spouting the lie that homosexuality is genetic instead of volitional. Which didn't win him even any fake media hosannas, either.
But he did get one thing correct in that Deface The Nation interview, even if it was as an afterthought:
The Florida senator's comments came Sunday on CBS's Face the Nation, where he said that it should be up to States rather than the Supreme Court to define marriage and that he considers marriage to be between a man and a woman.
Now, in the wake of the SCOTUS's disastrous, tyrannical Obergefell decision, Senator Rubio has dropped all pretense of being pro-marriage and pro-Constitution and blown that previously expressed stance out the nearest airlock as well:
Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio said Wednesday he would oppose a constitutional amendment allowing States to ban same-sex "marriage" after the Supreme [imposed] it nationwide, even though he disagrees with the landmark 5-4 decision.
How does this make any sense, given the stance on the issue he previously claimed only two and a half months ago? If Senator Rubio believes that marriage is a State, and not federal, issue, how can he oppose a constitutional amendment that would restore that status quo?
The next 'graph is even more garbled:
“I don’t support a constitutional amendment. I don’t believe the federal government should be in the marriage regulation business,” the Florida senator told reporters after a speech the Cedar Rapids Country Club in Iowa.
But the SCOTUS used Obergefell to put the federal government into the "marriage regulation business"; the proposed constitutional amendment would reverse that usurpation, which Rubio purports to oppose. So how can he oppose the amendment? Is he confusing it with the Federal Marriage Amendment, which I guess kinda sorta would involve the feds in legally defining marriage, but would at least do so in a legal, constitutional way?
“We can continue to disagree with it. Perhaps a future court will change that decision, in much the same way as it’s changed other decisions in the past. But my opinion is unchanged, that marriage should continue to be defined as one man and one woman. The decision is what it is, and that’s what we’ll live under,” he said.
That is the most confused but whole-heartedly enthusiastic embrace of defeatism I may have ever seen in my half-century-plus on this planet. It's like Rubio has his opinion about marriage, but it's just some sort of minor, irrelevant abstraction that pales in comparison to the almighty power of the Supreme Court of the United States, which apparently dwarfs God Himself in its, well, "supreme" moral authority. At least in the junior Florida senator's "opinion".
He's all but come out in support of gay "marriage"; why not just make it official? Because, of course, that would infuriate the GOP base even more than he already foolishly has on this topic. So why not just give lip service support to the marriage federalism Amendment that everybody knows will never pass and move on? It would be consistent with his claimed "marriage is between a man and woman" stance at least, and would be something that would be quickly forgotten. He wouldn't even have to do so as enthusiastically as Scott Walker and Ted Cruz already have. It would cut his losses on this issue and close off an unneeded distraction. Now it's all but guaranteed that Rubio and Mike Huckabee will get into a fistfight right there on stage at the first debate.
To me, this once again illustrates how much of a greenhorn Rubio is as a national politician. He's taken an issue that could and should have had a one-sentence answer - "Marriage is a State issue, and I'm running for president of the United States, thus, it is not a germane question" - and turned it into a rhetorical clusterfark that is becoming emblematic of his candidacy. Not that he had any real chance at the GOP nomination anyway, but this, in my mind, puts him in Dan Quayle territory as a vice presidential candidate as well. "Not ready for prime time," as it were.
Second look at Ted Cruz for veep?
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