Gay-marriage monkey see... gay-marriage monkey do....

Bush pushes for gay marriage ban - Politics - MSNBC.com:

Ladies and gentlemen, if you look south of the border you can see a desperate president with approval ratings in the 30's making a desperate, some say disgusting political ploy to rally his so-called "Christian" conservative base to the polls for this year's mid-term elections by attempting to write bigotry and discrimination into the Constitution of the United States of America....

And now if you shift your gaze 180 degrees and look north of the border you will see a conservative Prime Minister who, when he is not feuding with the national news media and making false claims of bias, he can be seen in his natural habitat of mimicking the US President by scheduling a vote on same-sex marriage in the House of Commons in the fall of 2006....

So why do this? And who is monkeying who in this case?

What do the articles say?:

"An election-year debate on the constitutional amendment to define marriage as a union between a man and a woman was never in doubt, however doomed the legislation. As Republicans geared up to defend their majorities in the House and Senate, conservative groups earlier this year let them know that they were dissatisfied with the GOP’s efforts on several social issues, including gay marriage."

What does A.L. say?:

Bush fears a loss of the Republican majorities in the House and the Senate.

Why?

Because a Democratic House could move forward on articles of impeachment and a Democratic Senate would then mete out the punishment.

For what?

Illegal surveilance of Americans on US Soil, over-hyping Iraq war intelligence known to be false, etc.

Would they really do that?

Surely those are much more heinous crimes against the country than lying about cigars, a blue dress, and office stress-relief practices.... If not, what kind of bizarro-world are we living in?

In Canada, the PM's moves are a little more puzzling, but maybe better politics, and maybe with slightly more moral justification.

During the campaign Harper said he would re-visit the Same-Sex Marriage issue, and now he is doing just that.

But, this is not really going to bring him any political advantage. He wants to increase his seat-count in both Ontario and Quebec if he is to achieve his desired Parliamentary majority. In both provinces, reversing SSM is not a popular idea.

So, to deflect that criticism a bit, the vote will only be on whether Parliament would like to re-visit the SSM issue, and not a direct vote to bring back the supposed "traditional definition of marriage". So, people can be absent, and MPs can come up with all manner of talking points to explain how their vote (either way) actually supports the view of those for and those against SSM.

It's actually pretty good politics.

So folks, you can see both politicians are pandering to their respective bases, but one is attempting to distance himself a bit from his base, and the other is trying to get cozier.

Our tour of the Canada-US border ends here.... Come back soon! It may not be the world's longest undefended border for long!

A.L.