Froomkin: Nobody's Buying (gay marriage ban)

I certainly hope he's right.

President Bush this afternoon speaks out in favor of a constitutional amendment that would ban gay marriage.

But nobody's buying it.

Not the Senate, where there's not even a remote chance that the amendment will muster the required two-thirds majority this week.

Not the critics, who see Bush's posturing on the issue as nothing more than a bald-faced sop to his increasingly restive social-conservative base -- and a desperate attempt to change the subject from the grimmer, more important issues that are appropriately disquieting the public.

And not even that social-conservative base, whose members doubt the intensity of Bush's commitment to the issue. The president has actively ignored this issue until this week, most notably by refusing to twist arms on the Hill. According to an old Bush friend quoted in Newsweek today, the issue is not one that Bush cares about -- except for its political significance. And two of his most loyal top advisers -- Vice President Cheney and First Lady Laura Bush -- have publicly distanced themselves from using the issue as a political wedge.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/linkset/2005/04/11/LI2005041100879.html

Everyone knows (no matter what side) what's going on here - an exercise in futility because it will never pass - a huge waste of time. A cheap attempt to appease the righties, and they outght to have a very sour taste in their mouths; Bush is mocking them.

If Monkeyboy wanted this at the top of his agenda, he would have struck while his iron was hot, when everyone was scared shitless and people weren't challenging him.

See this for what it is--an act of craven desperation by a guy whose poll numbers are dropping like an elevator in free-fall. He's trying to wedge, to rally, to invigorate. But really, who cares? Is not letting Bob and Fred, or Bettie and Sue, marry gonna lower gas prices? Bring the troops home in something other than aluminum boxes? Create jobs with decent benefits? Improve the quality of schools and access to higher education? Repair our damaged image around the globe?

It's flop-sweat FEAR time...and the ones who are scared are the desperate GOP.