I agree that Democrats need to reject hatred of Christianity. The vast majority of Democrats don't support this, but the misperception is definitely a problem.
I guess I just don't see how gay marriage threatens anyone, however. It is merely an acknowledgement that all people are equal, and since homosexuality is not a lifestyle choice, and it doesn't hurt anyone else who isn't homosexual, I fail to see how granting these people equal rights is bad for society.
If anything, gay marriage will improve moral values by making it more likely for gay people to engage in monogamous relationships. It is in society's best interests to promote monogamy, and that's why we give special benefits for married couples. Does it not also make sense to promote monogamy within homosexuals as well?
So once again, as I've said about many issues, it goes both ways. I agree with your points, but Republicans have to realize that not all traditions are good. It may be a traditional moral value that homosexuals are condemned and treated with scorn and contempt, and not given equal rights, but I don't feel that is a tradition that fits with traditional American ideals of social justice and allowing people liberty and pursuit of happiness so long as it does not harm others.
The problem for the Democrats is that they have been defined by their extremists.
Personally, I am ambivalent about gay marriage. I don't believe homosexuality is a lifestyle choice for most people, but to me the idea of marriage being between a man and a woman is so firmly entrenched that I can't think of a gay relationship as marriage. I know several gay couples, some very close friends and relatives, but I can't say that I consider their relationships to be marriages. To me, the term "marriage" is reserved for an intimate relationship between a man and a woman, and gay relationships may have some of the characteristics of marriages, but I define them as something else.
I think that the push for gay marriage is premature, and that the advocates of gay marriage are taking the wrong approach by trying to push it through the courts. Social activists have been making this mistake ever since the civil rights movement. This approach worked initially for the civil rights movement, with the Brown vs. Board of Education decision, but even there, the most durable gains came through the legislative process, not the courts. The reality is that anything that the civil rights movement got through the courts (such as school integration) has largely evaporated, but what they got through the legislative process (integration of public facilities and voting rights) has endured.
Based upon the margins by which the gay marriage bans passed in those 11 states, the public is clearly not ready for gay marriage, and attempting to get it through the courts may achieve tactical success in certain places, but it will never be durable if achieved that way, just as Roe vs. Wade is not durable.
The Democrats became identified with the push for gay marriage, but it was not this issue alone that has made the Democrats unpalatable to many in middle America. It is a whole pattern of things, of which this is just a reinforcement. The Democratic elite's protrayal of Christians as backward rednecks has really hurt the party in middle America. It plays great in the salons of Manhattan and San Francisco, but not so well outside those areas. The fact is, some religious zealots are over the top, but that doesn't mean that Christians in general are bad. And the Democratic Party has its own version of backward rednecks and ignoramuses. I have read some commentary on the election results from liberals, and their disdain for middle America is so clear, and very disturbing.
Each party has its extremists, and the job is to keep the extremists in the camp, because their votes are needed, without allowing them to be too visible, and to define the party. The primary process has made it a lot harder to do this. If the party bosses had more influence, they may have nominated someone like Joe Lieberman or Evan Bayh, rather than John Kerry. But it's hard to get a moderate through the primary process, since the primary voters are generally the most partisan voters. Republicans have a similar problem, but they contained it better this election cycle. What comes next is anyone's guess.
