I can’t decide which I like better: The one of the rainbow flag flying over the White House (victory!) or the one of the omnipotent American father holding up the two male cake toppers, a beatific glow around him, the whole cultural world literally in his hands. But where’s the one of him desperately trying to cover Biden’s mouth on “Meet the Press” before he inadvertently forced O to “courageously” profess the belief he’d been cowardly hiding for decades? Or how about one showing a group of wealthy gay Democratic bundlers, young voters, and assorted limousine liberals presenting him with one of those giant sweepstakes-placard checks for $100 million? Alas, that degree of realism about what really motivated this “evolution” falls to one of the country’s three or four conservative editorial cartoonists to grapple with. Or what about this one from American Weasel, which nicely illustrates the possibility that Obama miscalculated on this issue?
Speaking of which, via Mediaite, here’s Sharpton and Bashir trying to puzzle out how anyone can think Obama “evolved” for political advantage when Romney’s been the big winner poll-wise so far. Answer: The key words there are “so far.” Once Biden pushed this issue front and center, O faced the dilemma of keeping up the lie about his beliefs while the media carped ever more loudly about it or coming clean and facing a backlash among older voters, black Democrats, and socially conservative independents. Like I said last week, he probably reasoned that it was better to ‘fess up now, collect millions in donations from his newly excited base, and count on voters’ attention spans to make them forget all about this come November than to let it drag out and potentially blow up in his face at an inopportune moment later on. Romney’s not going to stray too far afield to talk about SSM lest it complicate his economic message so Obama’s betting that by election day it’ll be more or less a non-issue. My hunch is that he’s probably right about that, especially if something happens between Israel and Iran, but eyeball this new data from ABC showing a gap, including among independents, between the number who strongly oppose Obama’s new position and the number who strongly support it. No surprise there. But will it endure?
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