JOAN VENNOCHI
Mitt leads GOP ploy on gay unionsBILL CLINTON, Monica Lewinsky, and the Democrats vs. George Bush, the Federal Marriage Amendment, and the GOP.
Nothing in politics is accidental. On the campaign trail yesterday in Cincinnati, Bush promoted what campaign aides called a compassion agenda -- a $1.2 billion program to promote marriage in poor communities. Today, Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney is scheduled to testify before Utah Senator Orrin Hatch and the Senate Judiciary Committee. The topic: "Preserving Traditional Marriage; A View from the States." Later in the day, Romney is scheduled to appear before the Heritage Foundation, speaking on "The Fate of Marriage: What Massachusetts Means for the Nation." Romney is working a third front for the president's reelection campaign -- the "culture wars," the euphemism that covers a range of hot-button social issues, including GOP opposition to same-sex marriage. The Hatch hearing will showcase a proposed constitutional amendment to give states the authority to decide what form of marriage they will honor within their borders and allow them to refuse to recognize marriage contracts deemed legal in other states. The hearing, twice delayed, is part of a larger Republican strategy to help focus attention on social issues in the weeks leading up to the Democratic National Convention. Senate Republican leaders said last week that they plan to put a federal ban on gay marriage to a vote by mid-July, forcing Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts and other Democrats to cast a controversial ballot. The strategy is helped by the launch of the Clinton book tour and the renewed focus on the moral lapses of the ex-president. A week ago at a Republican Leadership Caucus, Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania pressed the case for an accelerated vote on the marriage amendment. According to one account of the session, relayed by a Democratic consultant who is working with Federal Marriage Amendment opponents, senior Republican senators, including Ted Stevens of Alaska and John Warner of Virginia, expressed reluctance about such a vote. However, Santorum prevailed, saying he wanted to force Kerry and Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota to vote. Santorum told colleagues that polling data from South Dakota indicate Daschle's vote against such an amendment could cost him the election. In announcing his intention to hold the vote the week of July 11, two weeks before the Boston convention begins, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said the timing means senators "won't be able to waffle back and forth." Now comes word that Romney is officially taking his fight against gay marriage from Massachusetts to Washington. "The governor was invited by the Senate Judiciary Committee to give his perspective on gay marriage in Massachusetts, and he accepted the invitation," said Romney spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom, via e-mail. "I think what it means is that Congress is interested in hearing from the chief executive of the one state in the nation to legalize gay marriage. For some time now, the governor has been a supporter of the Federal Marriage Amendment as the most reliable way to preserve the traditional definition of marriage." According to Fehrnstrom, "There hasn't been any communication with the White House regarding the governor's testimony. We've been dealing with the Judiciary Committee and staff." Asked if such appearances are part of an effort to raise Romney's national profile, Fehrnstrom said, they might lead to that, "but not by design. When you're the governor of the one state in the nation where gays can legally marry, people are going to want to know your opinion." Last week, the Romney adminstration, first through Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey and then directly through the governor, called upon Kerry to resign his Senate seat. In arguing for Kerry's resignation, Romney cited a May 11 Senate vote on federal unemployment benefits, which he said cost Massachusetts $75 million. Professing concern for the unemployed seems disingenuous, at best, since Romney has been trying to scale back state unemployment benefits. The true motive is more likely linked to a GOP effort to make sure Kerry votes on a controversial social matter, right before he accepts his party's presidential nomination. Bush is trying to reinspire conservatives, especially the Christian Coalition. "The whole gay marriage issue has caused a rebirth of the social conservative movement," Republican strategist Scott Reed told The Wall Street Journal. It is smart, totally cynical politics. However, after four years of the Bush administration, the voters may be smarter and even more cynical.
Joan Vennochi's e-mail address is vennochi@globe.com. © Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.
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