"The Marriage Problem That Comes Every Four Years"

This passage is something that would seem ham-handed in a novel about modern liberals...

As Isaac Pollak, an ardent Republican, kissed his wife goodbye before heading out on a business trip to Asia several years ago, he handed her his absentee ballot for the coming presidential election and asked her to mail it.

Bonnie Pollak, a Democrat, weighed her options. Should she be loyal to her spouse, respect his legal right and mail the ballot? Or remain faithful to her deeply held beliefs and suppress his vote?

"It was a real dilemma," says Ms. Pollak, 58 years old, a student in a doctoral program in social welfare who lives in Manhattan. "I decided to do the right thing."

Ms. Pollak threw the ballot away.

The one trope missing is that they do actually share the same last name. Otherwise...
 

I'm actually not certain whether I'm more amused or irritated.  But, in addition to illustrating the little liberal tropes (Ms. vs. Mrs., the advanced degree in a questionable soft subject), it illustrates one of the big ones - the conflation of public policy with private virtue.  She is so self-righteous in her public policy beliefs, that she believes the virtuous course of action is to betray her spouse in order to prevent one vote for Republicans,  a vote which would have had no impact on any race.

And that's just one event, one action by one person, so you can't blame everyone who shares her party and policy positions.  But it's symbolic of an attitude that I see expressed repeatedly.

"Pelosi...may well have made the Democrats' larger task harder..."

Tuesday night/Wednesday morning, I really thought that Obamacare Health Care Reform was dead. It's clear that a) the people of this country are fed up with the massive expansion of the government thus far, and the further expansion proposed, by this administration and Congress and b) there are, in fact, electoral prices to be paid. Rather than re-considering, however, the President and the Speaker went into full "damn the torpedos, full speed ahead" mode. And they passed it in the House.

And I started getting very worried. So I liked this post from Yuval Levin, who is more optimistic than I right now.

The trouble for the Democrats is that the Senate was always going to be the more difficult challenge for health care reform—because its members are not as far to the left on the whole, and because its rules require a supermajority and don’t give the majority leadership nearly as much power over the process. Nancy Pelosi has now made it even more difficult. So while the Democrats certainly took a major step on the old “how a bill becomes law” civics textbook diagram last night, it’s not nearly as clear that they made progress in the real world of legislative strategy. Nancy Pelosi made things a little easier on herself and her members by going first, but may well have made the Democrats’ larger task harder.

There's a little more, and it's worth reading...

And from someone else...

So, surfing after finishing my comments on same-sex marriage, I found Charles Winecoff making some of the same points...

The gay community is trying to usurp the word “marriage” without considering less antagonistic ways to attain the same goal (full legal rights). What the advantages might be - for them - in keeping the ideal of traditional marriage intact (most gay people are themselves products of heterosexual nuclear families) never even registers on their gaydar.

As “male” and “female” are increasingly viewed as archaic social constructs – or elective surgical options (thank you, “Chaz” Bono) - marriage is rapidly becoming just another disposable lifestyle choice, with children fashionable accessories (largely to make their parents feel like “good” people). This, of course, is not the fault of gays and lesbians; the deterioration started with irresponsible, sybaritic straight people. But to further dilute the original intent of marriage (to raise children and keep us all going) isn’t going to help anyone.

What can I say? I agree...

Same-sex marriage. Again.

Earlier this year, the legislature of the state of Maine passed a law extending the term "marriage," with all of the associated government policies, to homosexual couples. This was signed by the Governor, but did not yet go in to effect. A petition was signed by enough citizens to put a referendum on the ballot. Tuesday, the citizens of Maine voted, by a margin of ~53-47, to repeal that law.

Wednesday morning, there were several comments from facebook friends saying, in effect, "shame on you citizens of Maine!" And lot's of agreeing comments, and lamentations about "fear and prejudice," but not a single dissent, as near as I could tell. So, though I've written about this topic before, and my position has not changed, it seems that it's time to address it again.

Issue 1 - Marriage

Marriage is a societal institution. It has developed over thousands of years of human civilization, in virtually all societies, with some differences, but some fundamental similarities. It is an institution which has been bequeathed to us by those who came before, and as such, is carries within it much human wisdom which we should be hesitant to dispense with blithely.

It is my belief, based on my observation of the world, based on my reading of history, that marriage, while it has looked different in different times and places, and certainly has had political implications at times, has evolved and developed to serve three essential functions:

1. It domesticates men¹.


2. It provides material support for women.


3. It provides for the creation of a stable environment for raising the next generation.

Issue 2 - Men and Women

Obviously, there are assumptions behind my belief in those functions.

• Individuals are all different. That said, men and women, as groups, are inherently different. They communicate differently, they think differently, they approach problems differently, men are physically bigger and stronger, women are more nurturing. Etc., etc., etc. Certainly not all men are bigger than all women. Certainly, there are exceptions to all of these categories. As groups, however, these are facts.


• Men are, as a group, more aggressive. They are more likely to move on from place to place, less willing to commit to a mate, less interested in caring for young².


• Women are, as a group, more nurturing. Women are, as a group, more likely to need physical protection. Women, particularly those carrying young, and caring for young, are more likely to need provision.


• Children do best when raised by mother and father³.

Obviously, some of that is less relevant than it once was. It's a huge leap, however, to get from that to "it just doesn't matter anymore." I'm unwilling to make that leap.

Issue 3 - Government

Marriage is recognized by government and acknowledged by government but is not created by government. Marriage, as a fundamental building block of society, predates the government of the state of Maine, or the United States of America by millennia. Those governments have policies that support marriage, not because it decided to favor some citizens over others⁴, but because they recognized that a society built on functional families is more likely to be functional society than one which isn't. Many of us are tired and frustrated by the "it's for the children" style of nanny-state government, but the fact is that marriage laws are "for the children." A society that wants to thrive or grow or even just continue existing has to constantly replace its older population with children. If those children aren't nurtured, raised properly, educated, etc., they end up in prisons or on welfare or leading insurrections or finding other ways to waste society's resources.

Anything, therefore, which weakens the institution of marriage and the family, leads to the destruction of society. If we look around at our inner cities, where government policies have discouraged marriage and 3/4 of the youth are born out-of-wedlock to single mothers, we can see the whirlwind that we reap when we sow this particular wind.

Does the government expansion of the term "marriage" to cover same-sex relationships lead to the same effects elsewhere in society? I will tell you frankly, I don't know. It seems to me to risk a further erosion of the institution, which poses a risk to society with no obvious concomitant benefit.

Issue 4 - The "Debate"

There may be a compelling argument that there are societal benefits which accrue from this proposed change. I have yet to see it made by anyone, anywhere. What I have seen, repeatedly, are the terms "fairness," "equality," "prejudice," "fear" and "bias." I see people argue that those who are opposed to what is a fairly radical change to a fundamental societal institution want "to exclude those who aren't like themselves." That they can't "overcome their fear and prejudice." That they want "to deny the rights that they enjoy from their fellow citizens."

That's unfair. There may be some people who are prejudiced, some who are put off by what Glenn Reynolds calls "the 'ick' factor," but I don't seen any reason to think that that describes a significant portion of the opposition, never mind a majority. I believe that most of the "yes on 1" voters in Maine, like the prop. 8 voters in California, like the majority of voters who have objected everywhere that it's been put on the ballot, are hesitant to change a fundamental societal building block without any argument whatsoever as to why it might be a good idea.

Issue 5 - The "Pro" Argument

I haven't heard one.

I have heard a lot of people talking about "fairness and equality." That's not an argument, it's a campaign slogan. It's an emotional appeal, and it's an emotional appeal to a position which is based on unsupported assumptions. Assumptions with which I, and many others, do not agree. In order for that appeal to work, the following must be true:

1. Men and women are fundamentally the same. Therefore, male-male, female-female and male-female relationships are all fundamentally similar, and should be treated identically under the law.


2. Marriage laws exist for the government to convey benefits to one's sexual partners.

I reject both of those assumptions.

I've already spoken about my belief that men and women are different. (Neither is better, neither is worse - they're just different. Equal but complementary.) Therefore, relationships between men are different than relationships between women and both are different than relationships between men and women. Ignoring all of the various little differences, the big and fundamental difference is that a relationship between a man and a woman carries with it the potential for propagation of the species⁵.

Which is one of the key reasons marriage exists in the first place.

Issue 6 - The "How's it going to hurt Your marriage" question

"What are you afraid of? Is allowing gay citizens to share in the benefits of wedded bliss going to hurt your marriage?" Obviously not. Changing the law won't affect me in the least. It may not affect my children. At some point, it's going to affect someone. If those of us who are trying to prevent their fellow citizens from achieving equality trying to support the traditional marriage and family model are right, this would be yet another action that would lessen the importance of, and thus weaken, that model.

The French economist Fredric Bastiat introduced the world to the broken-window fallacy in an essay titled "That Which Is Seen and That Which Is Unseen." It's easy to see the obvious and immediate effects of a change to the marriage laws. It's much harder to see the long-term effects. The Law of Unintended Consequences is inexorable in its operation, and none of us can see far enough to know what all of the effects will be. Certainly the well-meaning liberals of the 60s who passed Lyndon Johnson's Great Society had no intention of creating a large and growing permanent underclass in the inner cities, or destroying the black family. Yet that's what those policies did. I look at the proposals to change the marriage laws, and while I understand the emotional impact of the "fairness and equality" slogan, I don't see the benefit that accrues to our society and to our civilization from those changes. And I can envision negatives down the road, as this change requires changes to adoption laws, and increases the number of fatherless children being raised in this society.

And that's a bad thing. I expect to be long gone by the time the full costs are evident, but that doesn't mean that those costs aren't coming.

Wrap up

As I said, there may in fact be compelling societal benefits that accrue from a change in the societal definition and concept of "marriage." It seems to me, however, that the onus would be on those that want to make the change to share with the rest of us what those benefits might be. And certainly, when we reach Huxley's Brave New World, where everyone is barren and children are grown in test-tubes and raised in nurseries, I'll withdraw any and all opposition, as marriage will no longer be relevant.

Until that time, however, I believe that there are good and rational and logical reasons to oppose it. I'm glad that the people of Maine made the decision that they did. And absent some compelling reason for changing my mind, I expect to continue holding that opinion.





¹ - The last time I said this, someone left a comment about how it was doing a disservice to men. Show me an article somewhere about groups of girls rampaging in the streets in a major city like Chicago or Paris, show me a female analogue to Lord of the Flies, and I'll re-think it. But I'm not going to hold my breath. And I'm not planning on re-thinking it any time soon.

² - Anyone want to speculate on whether there are more men that father children and then move on, not staying and supporting them, or women who have children and leave them with the fathers, moving on, not staying and supporting them? It's a pretty silly question, isn't it? We all want to believe that we're better than our ancestors, but the evidence strongly suggests that the veneer of civilization is thin...

³ - Don't bother telling me that there are exceptions. Of course there are. There are children growing up with mothers and fathers that are bad people, bad parents, and abusing the children. And there are children growing up with loving homosexual couples. I've seen that, I know it, I don't need anyone to make that comment. The issue here is the proper role for government, and I believe that role is supporting the traditional marriage institution and family unit.

⁴ - While I'm sure that some people hate this argument, and believe it to be sophistry, I think it's always worth noting that there actually aren't any barriers to homosexuals marrying, and many have done so. They are, like all citizens, limited to marrying persons a) of age, b) who are not close blood relatives, c) are not already married and d) who are of the opposite gender. Obviously, restriction "d" affects more people than the first two, though it's debatable as to how many restriction "c" affects. So the "fairness and equality" appeal falls a little flat here - they are already equal in the eyes of the law. What they want is identical treatment for those practicing a similar but fundamentally different behavior.

⁵ - Obviously, some heterosexual relationships aren't going to result in children. And some homosexual couples (primarily female) are going to be raising children. I don't think that changes anything. Government's awful at dealing with exceptional cases. (Which is a big argument for the smallest practical government. Which we're nowhere near at the moment.) The idea is to set the laws to support society in an appropriate way, and let individuals operate within the rules as best they see fit.

My apologies

I spent the day driving people hither and yon, and every time I sat down to start writing, I was focused on a different topic. I'll get y'all something tomorrow, I promise. (Probably not first thing in the morning, though.)

Some of the topics which I may or may not touch on:

• Virginia results - two thumbs up.



• New Jersey results - two thumbs way, way up.



• The spin on NY-23 from the White House is laughable.



• I'm glad the people of Maine voted "yes" on question 1.



• I fear, however, that it's a temporary respite. Let's face it - the gay-marriage advocates aren't going to stop until they get it, and they're eventually going to get it.



• I have yet to see a single argument in favor of that position. I see lots of "fairness and equality for all!" messages, but that's a campaign slogan, not an argument, and is based on at least two unsupported assumptions. (Tune in tomorrow if you're curious about what those are. I'll try to get to them.)



• The "noes" on 2 & 4 are just depressing. Somehow, the independent Yankees of down-east have been domesticated over the past couple of generations into docile wards of the state. "Thank you sir, may I have another! You take my money - I'll do without, and you'll take care of me later, right?" Very sad.

Really, I do apologize for not getting something out today. God knows that there was plenty to post, and I did a horrible job focusing on getting something done for you. But, after all, tomorrow is another day.

Is Christie outside the margin of fraud in NJ?

Joe Scarborough tweets:

Ed Rendell tells me off the MSNBC set that Corzine will win in New Jersey because of the Democrats' ground game. Don't bet against Rendell.

For "ground game," read "corruption and ballot fraud..."

Election day 2009

My fellow Americans - get out today and Vote!¹

If we're going to prevent a government takeover of the health care system, it's going to happen today. It's going to happen in NY-23, it's going to happen in NJ and it's going to happen in CA-10. It's going to happen in VA, too, but that one's really a foregone conclusion, and unless it's very close (bad) or very big (good), it won't mean much. In the language of Wall Street, a McDonnell victory over Deeds has already been "priced in."

How can the health-care takeover be prevented? After all, nothing that happens produces any effective change in the Congress. Obviously, the President will still be the President tomorrow, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid will still be running things on Capitol Hill, and the margins aren't noticeably changed. So how can it affect the health-care debate?

Because this one thing is true about our elected officials - they are, at heart, essentially cowards. They are willing to risk any amount of (someone else's) money and any amount of societal stability on pet projects, social experiments and the like, but there's one thing that they won't risk - their seats. They like their seats, they like their offices and their staffs, and they love the feeling of power that they have, and the way that people convince them that they are important. They are extremely unwilling, as a group, to give up ANY of that.

Today, the people of Virginia, who helped to elect Barack Obama a year ago, are going to reject him. They're going to reject the stimulus, they're going to reject higher taxes, and they're going to reject the health care takeover. They're going to the voting booth and express their dissatisfaction with the sharp leftist tack that this administration has taken. If they are joined in this message by the people of New Jersey (by sending tax-and-spender Jon Corzine into retirement) and the people of CA-10 (the Democrat is going to win, but very possibly by a smaller amount than the district's registration discrepancy) and the people of NY-23 (who have already spoken by driving Dede Scozzafava out of the race), that's a message that WILL be heard by the representatives of the "red" and "purple" districts that Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi need to pass this travesty. Those people want to keep their seats. If they're convinced by the conversion of tea parties and town hall meetings to actual voters that they can't both support Obamacare AND keep their seats, guess which one they're going to choose.

So it's a big day. And, as I said a couple of weeks ago, it's vital that this get done now if it's going to get done (which I hope and pray that it won't.)

While a year can be a long time in politics, there are enough members of Congress who are clearly "dead men walking" at this point that they know this is the chance, the only chance, to get this health care plan passed. If it doesn't go through this Congress, it isn't going to happen. A new session starts in January, and there's just no way on God's earth that something as unpopular as this plan looks to be happens during an election year. The stimulus has been an economic disaster, and, in retrospect, a public relations disaster. The "cash for clunkers" program isn't a laughing-stock in all areas and with all sections of the electorate, but it is with enough people that it's a net negative for the powers that be.

The Democrats may be able to keep the House of Representatives next November, but it's not a great bet, and they are almost assured of losing enough seats to make this kind of package impossible to pass again. The Democrats will almost certainly keep the Senate, but probably not with a filibuster-proof majority. Hence the desperation to get the Health Care System Takeover "Reform" Bill passed now.

So today is a big, big day. If you've got a vote today, use it.




¹ - If you're voting Republican or independent, anyway. Democrats should go out and vote on Wednesday...

;-)