Quote of the Day
I hear and I forget.
I see and I remember.
I do and I understand.
Confucius
Santorum Wins Non-binding Missouri Primary,
and the Minnesota and Colorado Caucuses
Santorum pulled off a minor hat trick at Romney's expense. The one clear loser tonight was Newt Gingrich. The fact that Gingrich didn't qualify for the Missouri primary (because he didn't file in time) helped Santorum with the non-Romney votes. (There were party rules about primaries to protect the traditional early states' status before Super Tuesday next month, and the Missouri legislature failed to move the primary back.) Santorum became the first in the field to win by majority vote 55-25% over a distant Romney in second.
The Minnesota caucuses had Santorum with 45%, Paul had his best showing of the night at 27%, and Romney placed a distant third at 17% (I had never seen a poll out of Minnesota with Romney leading). Michele Bachmann, a darling of the social conservatives and no doubt would have won the Minnesota caucuses going away if she was still in the race, went out of her way last week to quash talk of an imminent Romney endorsement. (I'm sure Romney will remember this fact in the future, say, when it comes to picking a VP or members of his Administration.)
The Colorado caucus vote was much delayed, but with almost all votes counted, Santorum beat Romney by 3 points, 39%-36%. The Colorado caucus was a mild upset because the few polls before it (by PPP) suggested Romney had up to a 10-point lead. Did we experience déjà vu from the Iowa campaign where the "hot conservative" caucus-goers jumped from a fading Gingrich to Santorum, more as a protest "stop-Romney" vote to prevent Romney from claiming a victory on the night?
What happened tonight? Was it a second failure of the Romney campaign to play Whack a Mole this time (this time Santorum, whom had been unable to follow up his photo-finish win over Romney), like when a fading Gingrich suddenly caught fire in the closing days of the South Carolina campaign?
In fact, the social conservatives in Minnesota and Missouri had more than enough incentive over the past week to resurface and make a statement, especially as the Ninth Court of Appeals upheld a federal judge overturning California's Proposition 8 (i.e., restoration of the traditional marriage definition to the California constitution) as unconstitutional and a recent very controversial decision of the Obama Administration under ObamaCare to require Catholic institutions to fund birth control in their benefit packages.
A number of progressive Democrats, who see Romney as the strongest challenger to Obama, were tweeting, happily pointing out that the 3 states are battleground states. That was a politically naive observation: first, candidates who are perceived as more moderate or independent don't do as well in caucuses or closed primaries. Second, in some states e.g., Iowa, Missouri and Minnesota, social conservatives in the GOP are more of a factor.
The fact of the matter is nearly all the recent GOP beauty contest polls nationally have Santorum at a distant third or fourth in a four-man race. It's possible that Santorum will displace Gingrich as second to Romney in these beauty contests over the days ahead, but is the GOP really going to nominate someone whom lost in a landslide for reelection in a purple state? I don't think so. In 2008 Huckabee continued to rack up Southern states after it was fairly clear that McCain was going to get the nomination, but McCain easily held these states in the general election.
I think in the long run, tonight's results have no real significance, more of a wake-up call to Romney that his Florida and Nevada wins didn't seal the deal. He is still the only candidate to finish in the money in every race to date.
Ninth Court of Appeals Sustains District Court Judgment:
Reinstatement of Traditional Marriage "Unconstitutional":
2-1 Decision: Thumbs DOWN!
Reading a legal opinion can be a maddening experience for any seriously intelligent individual. I understand the concept of equal protection, and I understand just like Congress can pass an unconstitutional law, so can the people. If we were talking about some incidental characteristic among people, e.g., "only people of the same religion [can marry]", "only people of the same race or ethnicity", etc., I would agree such restrictions on liberty would be unconstitutionally discriminatory, regardless of any proposed law or referendum.
I also dislike how the propagandists are framing the issue in a biased fashion: "banning gay marriage". Proposition 8 has the wording "only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California", the same wording as Proposition 22 (which I personally voted for while a California resident back in 2000). It was one of those legalistic hair-splitting things in the first place that resulted in the status quo: Proposition 22 was a statute, subject to California Supreme Court review. The California Supreme Court declared it unconstitutional. Proposition 8 was an attempt to establish the definition in the state constitution beyond Supreme Court reach. Opponents of Proposition 8, after it carried in the fall of 2008, filed in federal court. The federal district judge, himself gay, declared Proposition 8 unconstitutional. The sexual orientation of the judge and whether he should have recused himself was a second issue the Appeals Court heard, and all 3 judges agreed that there was no problem requiring the district judge's recusation. (I disagree.)
But traditional concepts of marriage and family are not arbitrary constructs. They have served functional purposes, norms for procreation in society's self-preservation and promotion of social stability. A more superficial analysis might point out idiosyncratic deviations from cross-cultural structural commonalities, e.g., polyandrous arrangements.
I have always been an avid reader; my mom's cousin still talks about how I would pick up volumes of her encyclopedia to read while on visits. I was on a Western Civilization kick at one point during my free time in undergraduate school and started reading this translated ancient Greek text. I came across this phrase "beautiful boys" and thought that it was odd--probably some error in translation. Only as I continued reading, I found the phrase subsequently repeated time and again. It suddenly occurred to me what it meant: "OH GROSS!" (and I was done reading that book). That's how I accidentally discovered that homosexuality was celebrated in ancient Greek and Roman society. I'm not wired that way; I don't understand the behavior, but I learned in my first psychology course that the it also occurs in other species. I do respect the privacy rights of consenting adults, even when their intimate relationship is inconsistent with my moral beliefs.
The issue has more to do with the social validation of certain relationships, and we make a useful distinction between tolerance and acceptance. For example, I respect the rights of others to associate, even when I strongly disagree with their agenda or morals (e.g., racist groups, the Westboro Baptists, etc.) I don't have to recognize the status of the pastor of the Westboro Baptists; for example, I wouldn't select him to give the opening prayer for some public event.
Proposition 8 does not ban gay, polygamous or other nontraditional civil unions; it simply recognizes certain institutions which have existed and been socially accepted for centuries, beyond recorded history. I'm sure to people in alternative relationships or lifestyles, that fact of life doesn't seem fair. In many cultures, alternative relationships are tolerated, but only the first qualified relationship is legally recognized. A Wikipedia article on polyandry makes related points: "In other societies, there are people who live in de facto polyandrous arrangements that are not recognized by the law... In Tibet, which is the best-documented cultural domain within which polyandry is practiced, certain polyandrists themselves testify that the marriage form is difficult to sustain." The syndicated Dr. Phil show recently showcased a variation of sororal polygyny: "Meet the Dargers: A happy family made up of one husband, three wives and 24 kids. Joe Darger and his wives, twin sisters Vicki and Valerie, and their cousin, Alina, join Dr. Phil". (Joe Darger is legally married to Alina. He claims in the O'Reilly piece that the relationship is a felony under Utah law. As a libertarian, I take a dim view of the prosecution of victimless crimes.)
I duly note that those who look, say, at the 72-day marriage of starlet Kim Kardashian to a pro basketball player (now who could have ever imagined that wouldn't last?) or a large percentage of divorces and/or single-parent homes in urban centers, think that traditional marriage in modern-day America is in trouble. But that's a topic for a future commentary.
The Court of Appeals overplayed their hand, and I hope SCOTUS picks up the case.
Musical Interlude: My Favorite Groups
The Guess Who, "No Sugar Tonight/New Mother Nature"
