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Bob Barr – More than a “spoiler” for McCain

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Sunday, June 29, 2008 8:08:36 PM
I’m getting a little tired of the media blathering on about how Bob Barr is simply a potential spoiler for John McCain. Regardless of whether or not Bob Barr was in the race, many people won’t vote for McCain. I certainly wouldn’t. I felt the same way about George Herbert Walker Bush.
 
I cast my first vote in 1980, when I happily voted for Ronald Reagan. I voted for Reagan again in 1984.
 
There was no way that I was going to vote for Bush in 1988 because I did not believe the nonsense about him being Reagan’s heir apparent. I supported Jack Kemp in the primary. When Kemp lost the nomination, I jumped shipped and supported Ron Paul, who was the Libertarian nominee. In 1992 I supported Pat Buchanan. When he lost the primary, I voted for Ross Perot.
 
This year, I’m voting for Bob Barr.  If Barr wasn’t in the race, there would still be at least three candidates that I would vote for over McCain on foreign policy matters alone. They are: Chuck Baldwin, Ralph Nader, and Barack Obama.
 
John McCain’s views are so orthogonal to my own that he wouldn’t get my vote regardless of who else was running against him. Staying home on election day would be a better choice than McCain.
 
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The End of Oil Tyranny

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Tuesday, June 17, 2008 9:20:41 PM
Honda’s first commercial fuel cell powered cars rolled off the production line in Japan yesterday. The Honda FCX Clarity goes from 0 to 60 in about 9 seconds. The car can travel up to 280 miles per “fill up”. It can reach speeds of 100 miles per hour. It’s a good looking car and an engineering marvel.

Fuel cells generate power by producing an electrochemical reaction between hydrogen and oxygen to convert chemical energy into electrical energy that powers the car. Fuel cells don’t pollute. The only thing that comes out of the tailpipe is water.

Honda has sold the first few hydrogen cars to some Hollywood celebrities, including Jamie Lee Curtis.

General Motors has also been testing fuel cell versions of the Chevy Equinox for a couple of months.

Unfortunately, the cars are only available in limited markets – the Honda in the Los Angeles area and the GM in New York City and Los Angeles. One reason is that there aren’t many hydrogen refueling stations.

Honda and GM are ready to launch home hydrogen refueling stations to help bootstrap the market. Honda’s home refueling station will operate on natural gas, while GM’s will work off of electricity and solar power.

BMW, Mercedes, Volkswagen and most of the other major car companies have fuel cell vehicles under development. Honda and GM are out in front of the market.

We are witnessing the end of the energy control that the Arab Sheiks, Latin Dictators, and Russian Mafia have over the world.

It will take time, but how cool is that?
 
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Media Icon R.I.P.

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Tuesday, June 17, 2008 9:38:44 AM
One of America’s mainstream media icons passed away last week of a heart attack at the young age of 58. It’s so sad when someone goes before his time. By all accounts, he was a dedicated family man, good Catholic, and beer drinking sports enthusiast. In other words, he seemed like an all around American guy. I’m sure that I could have enjoyed a nice Guinness with him. I’m truly sorry for him and his family.

In spite of how nice some of the individuals are, I learned years ago not to trust the American media. Here are a few examples why:

During the early 1980s, the far left in Europe were enraged over the plans for America to deploy short range ballistic missiles in Europe. They formed the “Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND)”, which staged protests in Paris, Berlin, London, and other major European cities. That year, I spent a few weeks in Greece when I was in the Air Force.

The American airbase was simply an extension of the Athens airport. There were about 50 Greeks working on the base, running the cafeteria, the janitorial service, etc. One day, they went on strike for more money. There was a small picket line. We were told not to go to work. The strike lasted a couple of days.

Every day, we would receive a three day old VHS video tape from the military of the ABC news. One day we got this tape of Frank Reynolds “reporting” on how the CND closed the airbase in Athens. They had videos of these massive protests. The video was not marked “file footage”. We were all scratching our heads. Then we asked the Greek at the front desk of the hotel to take a look. He told us that this was footage of the Greek protests against the right-wing dictatorship from over a decade earlier. It was obvious to all that ABC News was staging a propaganda campaign against Ronald Reagan.

More than ten years later, I sat and watched “This Week with David Brinkley” on ABC, when Newt Gingrich was complaining that the news was not reporting on the blatant and provable lies that the Democrats were telling about some incident. Sam Donaldson responded by telling Gingrich that it wasn’t the media’s job to “report the truth”. Gingrich was stunned.

On a subsequent show, Cokie Roberts started whining about how the Internet was going to “destroy democracy” because it enables people to talk to each other without having the media gods in Washington filter and interpret what we can hear. Luckily for Cokie, there wasn't any internet full of bloggers 25 years ago to inform the American people that the reporting on the incident in Greece was media propaganda. Otherwise, her career might have been cut short.

Finally, this year, the all around American icon unfairly savaged Ron Paul on his show, I suppose because Ron was becoming a minor threat to the establishment political culture.
 
I have many more examples over the years of why the American media is untrustworthy, but I hope these few examples are enough to illustrate the point.
 
I am so thankful that the Internet has freed us from being captives of the mainstream media.
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John McCain and the American Gulag

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Monday, June 16, 2008 10:46:32 PM
Last week the United States Supreme Court upheld the right of Habeas Corpus. John McCain responded by saying that: the Supreme Court decision protecting habeas corpus "is one of the worst decisions in the history of this country."
 
Really???
 
What is habeas corpus anyway? Basically, it's the right not to be arbitrarily incarcerated by the government without being charged with a crime by a lawful authority. Article One of the United States Constitution explicitly upholds this right.
 
The writ of habeas corpus is even much older than the Constitution. It was first codified into law in England by the Maga Carta in 1215.
 
In old Soviet Union, and many other countries in the world, the government could imprison you, and hold you indefinitely without charge for as long as they wanted. John McCain apparently thinks this is a wonderful idea. Now he is angry that the Supreme Court won't throw away over 200 years of American law and almost 800 years of Western Civilization.
 
Just what country do you think you are living in Mr. McCain?
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Bob Barr's real potential -- more than a spoiler for McCain

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Sunday, June 08, 2008 10:13:16 PM
This week, former GOP House majority leader Dick Armey said that many Republicans will vote for Libertarian House candidates this year. Another former GOP House majority leader – Tom DeLay – admitted that his wife is planning on voting for Bob Barr. Earlier this year, DeLay said that McCain has done more to harm the GOP than any other elected official.
 
Obviously, a lot of people in the GOP are really unhappy with McCain. Bob Barr’s appearance on the Glen Beck show last Friday has a many of them thinking that there is another credible choice this year. So, it’s time to look at Bob Barr’s real potential. No, Barr’s potential isn’t to be another Ralph Nader, who got just enough votes in one state (Florida) to cost Gore the 2000 election. Given that 80% of the country thinks we’re heading in the wrong direction coupled with the enormous dissatisfaction with McCain, Barr’s real potential may be closer to Ross Perot’s, who won 19% of the vote in 1992.
 
Bob Barr’s campaign manager is Russ Verney – the same Russ Verney that managed Perot’s campaign. Verney’s strategy is to analyze past voting behavior and current voter mood to target counties that are ripe for Barr to exploit. This is a smart move because there are a lot of counties, even in states that are a sure bet for one of the major candidates, that could help Barr score big numbers. For example, Washington is a safe state for Obama. However, Perot won 24% of the vote there in 1992 and Paul received 22% of the vote in the GOP caucus this year, both largely by exploiting the counties that are east of the Cascade Mountains. If Barr wants to poll high enough to get into the debates, he is going to have to target his efforts and money wisely.
 
There is one difference between Barr and Perot. Perot was an independent candidate in 1992, while Barr is running on the Libertarian Party ticket. The party has had some minor successes at the state and local level, but they haven’t succeeded at electing anyone at the national level. Back to Armey’s statement about many Republicans voting for Libertarian House candidates this year. Wouldn’t it be interesting if Verney’s county level targeting could help drag along a new Libertarian Congressman or two? It’s unlikely, but this looks to be a very unpredictable year, so anything is possible.
 
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John McCain: Space Cadet

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Saturday, June 07, 2008 7:24:16 PM
 
This week brought us an incredible amount of bad news that bodes ill for our future, as well as John McCain’s bid for the White House.
 
Oil prices made their largest single day increase ever on Friday, surging nearly $11 a barrel to $139. This was after an increase of $5.50 the day before. The unemployment rate rose to 5.5 percent in May from 5 percent -- the largest monthly increase in 22 years. The Dow Jones industrials declined nearly 400 points, the biggest drop in more than 15 months. The already weak dollar plunged against the Euro and gold prices registered their largest increase in six months. Russian President Dimitry Medvedev warned that the world may be headed for the worst economic decline since the Great Depression.
 
If this wasn't bad enough, an Israeli Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz said that his country will attack Iran if it doesn't abandon its nuclear program. In addition, Israeli paper Ha'aretz reported that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was in Washington trying to convince Bush to set aside our own intelligence estimate that Iran halted its nuclear program in 2003. Instead, he wants Bush to use the data presented by Israel, which says that Iran is still actively pursuing nuclear weapons capability. Daniel Pipes, who is a neo-con political commentator, told the National Review that if Obama is elected, George Bush will attack Iran in the remaining weeks of his presidency.
 
What was John McCain’s response to all of this great news? Well, he wrapped up the week by telling a town hall meeting in Florida that he wants to send a man to Mars to "inspire" the American public, as they were inspired when Neil Armstrong walked on the moon in 1969.

I’m sorry Mr. McCain, but dredging up a stale idea from 1960s in a sad attempt to pretend that you have some vision is not going to fill our gas tanks, prevent Americans from dying in yet another senseless war, or put you in the White House.
 
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McCain and Obama: Environmental Twins

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Friday, June 06, 2008 9:24:17 AM
John McCain’s endorsement of the Eurocrat “cap and trade” system for limiting carbon emissions demonstrates once again that the GOP has virtually become the Democratic Party.  Of course, this isn’t the first time McCain has promoted this idea. In 2003, McCain and his good buddy Joe Lieberman introduced a “cap and trade” bill in Congress.

Europe’s experience with “cap and trade” demonstrates that it doesn’t work. Electricity costs have skyrocketed. Due to the lobbying of politically connected companies, most European countries participating in the program have higher carbon emissions today than they did when the treaty was enacted in 1997.
 
“Cap and trade” does little to help the environment and costs too much. Its only purpose is to further politicize the economy.
 
In the meantime, venture capitalists and entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley are pouring money and resources into solar energy technologies. New companies are springing up.   Established companies are retooling to provide solar cells in addition to microchips. For the first time in years, high tech factories are being built in Silicon Valley.

The price of solar electricity is still high, but it’s becoming more competitive.   Electricity prices in the U.S. range between 5 and 18 cents per kilowatt hour. Abengoa Solar is building a 280-megawatt solar plant in Arizona that will produce electricity at 15 cents per kilowatt hour. The hundreds of millions of dollars being invested in solar technologies in Silicon Valley will ensure progress towards making solar energy competitive to conventional sources of electricity.
 
Solar energy requires a lot of sun. Nevada is one of the sunniest states in the nation.   It’s also the seventh largest state in the country, covering 110,567 square miles. The federal government owns 86% of it.
 
Here’s a modest proposal for Bob Barr to differentiate himself from his rivals – auction off a portion of federal land in Nevada to companies who will use it to build solar farms.  Couple this with a tax holiday for companies that generate clean electricity. This will do a lot more to reduce carbon emissions than the bureaucratic schemes of the McCain-Obama twins.
 
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Bob Barr Democrats

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Tuesday, June 03, 2008 11:59:50 PM
It looks like Barack Obama has won the Democratic nomination. Congratulations to him. My guess is that he is going to be the next President. Not because he’s so great. Rather because George Bush has ruined the party that Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, Newt Gingrich, Bob Barr, Dick Armey, and others tried to build.
 
Obama has a big challenge ahead, namely that white, blue collar voters in the industrial Midwest don’t seem to be inclined to vote for him. The big question for Bob Barr is how he turns these “Hillary Democrats” into Barr voters.
 
One thing that Barr should propose is to bring our troops home to save our manufacturing base. The U.S. spends countless billions of dollars every year stationing troops in Japan and South Korea. These countries respond by doing everything they can to put GM, Ford, and Chrysler out of business. They are able to compete effectively because their total tax burden is significantly smaller than ours, in part because we are subsidizing their military defense. We need to end the huge defense subsidy that American taxpayers are shelling out to over to 130 countries around the world and then use the savings to cut taxes to help make us more competitive.
 
We know why McCain won't propose this – he is admittedly clueless about the economy and he is too vested in his antiquated Cold War view of the world to make any real change. I do find it very odd that Obama won't talk about this either. Perhaps his elitist disposition makes him too tone deaf to the plight of blue collar Americans to care.
 
This gives Barr an opportunity to win over a lot of folks who voted for Hillary in the primary, while upholding our American libertarian values at the same time.
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Huckabee and the final GOP repudiation of Reagan

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Saturday, May 31, 2008 1:57:42 PM
Mike Huckabee’s comments this week stating that libertarianism is un-American signals the final Republican repudiation of Ronald Reagan, who said: “I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism. The basis of conservatism is a desire for less government interference or less centralized authority or more individual freedom and this is a pretty general description also of what libertarianism is.”
 
Huckabee is right in stating that libertarianism is more of a threat to the GOP than liberalism, given that the GOP have become even more liberal in their use of government power to control our lives than the Democrats. Consider this: George Bush and his GOP Congress have presided over the fastest growth in federal spending since LBJ's Great Society. They created the largest federal intrusion into the classroom in history (No Child Left Behind), the most expensive public-works program ever (the 2005 highway bill), and the largest new entitlement program (the prescription-drug benefit) since the creation of Medicare and Medicaid. They launched an alledged “war on terror” that spent upwards of $3 trillion, killed 4,000 Americans, and brought us $4 a gallon gasoline. They trampled over states’ rights on issues such as assisted suicide and medical marijuana. They expanded the government's power to spy on Americans.
 
Huckabee fits right in with this crowd. According to the Club for Growth, while he was governor of Arkansas, Huckabee increased state spending by 65%, increased the government workforce by 20%, raised taxes by 47%, and increased the state debt by $1 billion. He also had a strange penchant for releasing convicted murders and rapists from prison. During his tenure as governor, Huckabee issued more commutations and pardons than all of the six neighboring states combined. Those states include Texas, which has more than 8 times the population of Arkansas.
 
If this is what passes for "conservatism" today, please count me out.
 
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Ron Paul, Bob Barr and the 2008 Watershed Political Year

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Wednesday, May 28, 2008 9:19:00 PM
There have been two political watershed years in the last four decades, where third party Presidential bids helped usher in fundamental changes to the power structure in Washington.
 
In 1968, the racial divide in the Democratic Party enabled third party candidate George Wallace to win five southern states.  This helped put Nixon in the White House and started four decades of GOP domination of Presidential politics, as the once solidly Democratic South became solidly Republican four years later.
 
In 1992, George Bush’s general cluelessness about the economy helped Ross Perot mount a third party candidacy that won 19% of the popular vote. Perot ran on a platform of reining in the corrupt scoundrels in Washington, who were “spending our children’s inheritance”.   In 1994, Newt Gingrich seized that message and led the GOP into control of the House of Representatives for the first time in four decades. The budget was balanced four years later.
 
Will 2008 be another watershed political year?
 
The economy is in much worse shape that it was in 1992. Gas prices are at $4 a gallon. Inflation is on the rise. The housing market has collapsed. Over 80% of the voters think the country is heading in the wrong direction. Bush has the lowest approval rating in history. The GOP has been booted from control of Congress and has now lost three special congressional elections in what were “safe” districts for them. A huge portion of the GOP base is very unhappy with McCain. 
 
The Democratic Party may not be in great shape either. They are still deeply divided by race and an enormous number of white voters in the industrial Midwest don’t seem inclined to vote for Obama.
 
Voters have also turned against the Iraq war. McCain’s unconditional support for the war may make it difficult for him to attract the white Democratic voters who don’t like Obama.
 
The environment seems ripe for another political upheaval.   Enthusiasm for Ron Paul’s insurgent campaign in the GOP went up after McCain clinched the GOP nomination. For example, Paul won 16% of the primary vote in Pennsylvania, which was his highest total yet.  Pennsylvania is also one of those very large industrial states where white voters have not been kind to Obama. Clinton beat Obama there 55% to 45%.
 
The Libertarian Party has responded by nominating former GOP Congressman Bob Barr as their Presidential candidate. The interesting thing to note is that Bob Barr was first elected to Congress as part of Newt Gingrich’s reformist agenda in 1994, so he has some experience in leading great political change.
 
Can Bob Barr capitalize on the mood of the country and fashion a working coalition out of disgruntled Republicans and Democrats to shake up the show this year? The opportunity is definitely there. It’s now up to Barr to seize it.
 
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The Libertarian Party gets serious

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Monday, May 26, 2008 10:15:14 AM
I was briefly involved in the Libertarian Party 20 years ago when Ron Paul was their Presidential nominee. I left after the 1988 election because they seemed more interested in being a sanctuary for the faithful rather than an organization that was serious about actually winning elections and affecting change. I’m a results-oriented guy. I don’t have time to waste with people who aren’t serious about accomplishing their goals.
 
Their selection of Bob Barr for President and Wayne Allyn Root for Vice President this weekend indicates that the LP has changed in big, important ways.
 
Bob Barr was a four term Congressman from Georgia. During his stay, he was probably the second most “libertarian” Congressman next to Ron Paul. Yes, there were a few very public issues where he wasn’t libertarian at all. However, after leaving Congress in 2003 Barr has worked closely with organizations on the left (ACLU) and right (ACU) to oppose the authoritarian trends that haunt this country today.
 
Wayne Allyn Root is a businessman, Las Vegas television personality, author, and odds maker. He came from a blue collar background and became a self-made millionaire. Root has the energetic stage persona of Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, coming across a bit like a guy you'd see on an infomercial at 3am.
 
Barr chose Russ Verney as his campaign manager. Russ was Ross Perot’s campaign manager. So, holy smokes, the Libertarian Party actually has a team that is serious about success and knows how to get things done. Given the mood of the voters this year, I suspected that the Libertarian Party will have its best showing ever.
 
It’s going to be a very interesting political year.
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The return of Fred Thompson

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Saturday, May 24, 2008 11:12:05 AM
Fred Thompson has returned to the public stage with a new blog and a wonderful article in the Wall Street Journal, entitled: “The Death of Conservativism is Greatly Exaggerated”.  Here’s what he said:

Some conservatives try to avoid philosophical confrontation with liberals, often urging solutions that would expand the government while rationalizing that the expansion would be at a slightly slower rate. This strategy simply has not worked. Conservatives should stay true to their principles and remember:

- Congress cannot repeal the laws of economics. There are no short-term fixes without longer term consequences.

- In a free and dynamic country with social mobility, there will be great opportunity but also economic disparity, especially if the country has liberal immigration policies and a high divorce rate.

- An education system cannot overcome the breakdown of the family, and the social fabric that surrounds children daily.

- Free markets, not an expanding and more powerful government, are the solution to today's problems. Many of these problems, such as health-care costs, energy dependency and the subprime mortgage crisis, were caused in large part by government policies.
 
Sorry, but one has to wonder why he never got around to saying these things while he was actually running for President.  However, he is right -- many “conservatives” (and most of the GOP) do indeed advocate so-called "solutions" that do nothing but expand the power of government. That’s precisely the problem and it has to stop.
 
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We're not going to take it anymore!

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Friday, May 23, 2008 5:41:46 PM
I just read the text of Richard Viguerie’s speech at the LP convention. It was 100% on the mark -- the political establishment has indeed failed America in every way.  Here are some excerpts from his speech:
 
Never in the history of America have our leaders failed us in so many big ways: The mortgage crisis; Schools that don't educate; America being dependent on the likes of the Saudi royal family and Hugo Chavez for our energy supplies; Over 59 trillion dollars of unfunded debt; Programs such as ethanol - enriching a few while raising the price of food for all, and harming the environment in the name of protecting it; Judges who twist the law to their own ends, who ignore the Constitution; Politicians and bureaucrats who ignore the Constitution; Wars without end; and campaign laws and ballot access laws that are really designed to limit competition, to protect fat cat special interests from grassroots competition and to protect the monopoly shared by the Republicans and Democrats.
 
He had particularly harsh words for the GOP:

I can visualize a meeting in Karl Rove's White House office in January 2001 with the Republican leadership to decide on a governing strategy and someone coming up with the idea of a one-word governing idea: No, not "strategery." BRIBERY... as in "Let's bribe the voters."

They tried to bribe the voters with trillions of dollars of your children's inheritance. They tried to bribe the people of faith with the Faith Based Initiative. The Republicans bribed the farmers with the largest farm subsidies in American History (and in the spring of 2008 they are doing it again). They joined with Ted Kennedy on "No Child Left Behind" - a huge bribe, $23 billion for just the last year, a program that has also had the effect of greatly expanding federal control of local schools. They bribed Midwest steel workers by putting a tariff on steel imports. They bribed seniors with a $10 trillion prescription drug bill. They bribed the entire state of Florida with money to repair homes in areas where no sane person would build unless someone else was paying for hurricane damage.

All of this was done for the purpose - the immoral and corrupt purpose - of holding onto power.
 
A lot of conservatives are tired of this. Many aren’t going to vote for McCain.
 
We need to send a loud, clear signal that we won’t tolerate business as usual.  Ron Paul demonstrated that the time is ripe for people who believe in individual liberty to make a real impact. However, a lot of conservatives are thinking that they might stay home on election day. The message they’ll send by staying home will be interpreted as apathy rather than outrage. The LP has a great opportunity to make a difference this year by capitalizing on voter angst. They can only seize the opportunity if they nominate someone who has the leadership skills and credibility to succeed.  Bob Barr can be that person.
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Not your Father’s GOP

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Tuesday, May 20, 2008 5:30:23 PM
I just read a great article by Paul Craig Roberts. Roberts was an assistant Treasury Secretary in the Reagan Administration. He is one of a growing number of conservatives who view the current GOP as more of a threat to our nation than a solution to our problems (many of which, the GOP itself has created during the Bush Administration).  Some excerpts from the article:
 
Conservatives have confused loyalty to country, which is loyalty to the Constitution, with loyalty to the Bush Regime. It is purely a partisan loyalty based in emotion--"you are with us or against us."
 
When I was a young man conservatives were frustrated that facts, reason and analysis could not penetrate liberal emotion. Today facts, reason and analysis cannot penetrate conservative emotions. When I write a factual column describing how we have been deceived into wars that are clearly not in our interest, self-described conservatives indignantly write to me: "If you hate America so much, why don’t you move to Cuba!" Conservatives have become so intellectually pathetic that they regard my defense of civil liberties as an anti-American act.
 
Today’s conservatives are so poorly informed that they cannot understand that to lose the Constitution is to lose the country.

It seems as though the general public agrees, given that the GOP has now lost three special congressional elections in as many months in districts that were thought to be “safe” for the GOP.
 
How much lower will the GOP sink before they wake up?
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Gay Marriage: Conservatives are culpable too

Posted by Eric Blankenburg on Saturday, May 17, 2008 10:10:45 AM
The recent California Supreme Court ruling stating that marriage between gays is a constitutional right should be a big wake up call to conservatives. I for one don’t give a hoot what consenting adults do.   If two people of the same sex want to have a contractual arrangement called “marriage”, I don’t care. However, a lot of people do find the concept of gay marriage to be immoral. Now, they are going to be forced to recognize its legitimacy in their daily lives.
 
Here is the magic question that conservatives never ask: why does one need a government license to get married? Just try asking this question and you’ll find that most people will recoil on horror over the mere suggestion that government has no business being involved in marriage.
 
However, for most of western history marriage was a private contract between two families.
 
Governments didn’t start issuing marriage licenses in America until the 1920s. Marriage licenses were originally created to prevent whites from marrying people of other races.
 
During the 1970s, government used their power over marriage to create “no fault divorce laws” that enabled the dissolution of a marriage without any proof of adultery, abandonment, felony or other legally culpable act.  This greatly increased divorce and illegitimacy, swelled welfare rolls, and led to the general moral breakdown and chronic crime in our cities.
 
Now, courts in Massachusetts and California have issued mandates that will once again alter the fundamental concept of marriage.
 
Government control over marriage started as a way to prevent people from exercising their right to marry whomever they want.  Now, government control is being used to force everyone to accept marriages that many find objectionable.
 
As is the case with everything government touches, their control over marriage has corrupted and destroyed it.
 
Unfortunately, most “conservatives” don’t understand this. Many are just as eager as the left to use government power to force their mandates on society. That’s exactly the problem.
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