Here are some interesting tidbits from this New York Times article:
All but one of the 44 Senate Democrats — Ben Nelson of Nebraska — have voiced opposition to the measure, as have some moderate Republicans, a result that would kill the measure for the year.
Remember this vote requires 2/3rds of the Senate to vote for it so now they got 56 of the needed 67 votes. Perhaps they are getting closer or perhaps:
Senator Arlen Specter, Republican of Pennsylvania, said that while he believed marriage should be between a man and a woman, he said he would vote against the amendment to ban gay marriage because the matter was already being addressed by the states. He quoted the late Sen. Barry Goldwater as saying that government “ought to be kept off our backs, out of our pocketbooks and out of our bedrooms.”
“This is a matter which ought to be left to the states, and the states are taking care of it,” he said. “It’s a matter of privacy, it’s a matter of tolerance, two very, very highly placed values in our society.”
These two just negated each others vote.
We have a Congress that is taking the most time off in recent history and yet they choose to use their time in the halls of Congress to debate an issue that is already dead.
Every American should be outraged over this. The Republicans in Senate, headed by Bill Frist, have effectively said “fuck the Iraq war, fuck the economy, fuck healthcare, fuck gas prices, fuck immigration, fuck the deficit, fuck everything – we are only worried about pandering to a small fraction of our party”. This is the most blatant insult to every single American outside of the radical-right there has ever been. They are to be working for the good of the American people as a whole, not for a small percentage of America. They have now neglected their constitutional duties and should all be removed from office.