GOP plans votes on favored causes

[TriSec]

Moves will bolster party's voter base, strategists say.

By James Kuhnhenn, Knight Ridder | June 5, 2006

WASHINGTON -- When President Bush beat Senator John F. Kerry in 2004, Republicans said a ballot initiative in Ohio to ban gay marriage sealed the election, drawing legions of conservatives to the polls.

Bush and Republican senators now will seek another dose of conservative magic to energize their party's base.

Call it nostalgia -- or election-year jitters.

This week's expected detour into some of the party's favorite social causes comes as Congress is locked in a stalemate over immigration policy, paralyzed over ethics legislation, and flummoxed by the Iraq war.

On Saturday, Bush urged support for a national ban on gay marriage, saying that the bond between a wife and a husband ``promotes the welfare of children and the stability of society."

Today, the president plans to meet at the White House with opponents of gay marriage, just as the Senate begins debate on a constitutional amendment to limit marriage to the union of a man and a woman.

A Senate vote on the issue is expected Wednesday.


Continued...

[OKNancy]

1. TriSec - Please fix your link

there are two http// in the link

[TriSec]

3. fixxity

[phylny]

2. When is he going to endorse a bill making divorce illegal, since

the bond between a wife and a husband "promotes the welfare of children and the stability of society"?

[liberal N proud]

4. It would do more to protect the sanctity of marriage than banning gays

from joining together.
But there is much to be made for the lawyer friends in divorces.

[LizW]

5. The Party that hates together stays together. n/t

[soup]

6. From the article -

>``I can't believe the American people can't see through this," Senator Joseph Biden, Democrat of Delaware, said yesterday on NBC's ``Meet the Press."

``We already have a law, the Defense of Marriage Act. . . . Nobody has violated that law," Biden said. ``There's been no challenge to that law. Why do we need a constitutional amendment?"

``I think this just highlights the fact they have no intention, they have no plan, to deal with healthcare," Biden said. ``They have no plan to deal with our national security. They have no plan to deal with the energy crisis."<

And then, just in time before the 4th of July - they're going to take up the ban on flag burning. Oh, no, nothing obvious going on here... :eyes:

[Chipper Chat]

7. Biden and the other 47 or so Dems should walk out of Congress

en masse when Frist calls for discussion on this ridiculous bill. Reid should call a press conference and tell the American people they'll return to work as soon as the Republicans regain their sanity and want to do something about the country's real problems. Of course they're too chicken to do this.