Clint Eastwood and gay marriage: Political tipping point for conservatives?
Movie icon Clint Eastwood 鈥� who famously mocked Barack Obama at the Republican convention last summer 鈥� has joined the president in supporting same-sex marriage.
No, Mr. Eastwood 鈥� he of that empty chair used as a prop in Tampa, Fla. 鈥� has not shucked his generally conservative ways. But he has joined with more than 100 other conservatives and Republicans who recently came out for gay marriage, among them former governors, GOP administration senior officials, and prominent right-leaning pundits.
In fact, as Mike Flynn at Breitbart.com pointed out in first reporting Eastwood鈥檚 move, the actor and Oscar-winning director is as much a political libertarian as anything else.
But the news does indicate an important shift among conservatives on this hot-button social issue, particularly among younger voters for whom same-sex marriage is no big deal 鈥� a political demographic the GOP badly needs to woo. Or as the Pew Research Center puts it, 鈥淢illennials are almost twice as likely as the Silent Generation to support same-sex marriage.鈥�
And if nothing else, it may signal a tipping point in public attitudes just as the US Supreme Court is about to decide two critical cases: the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and California鈥檚 Proposition 8, banning gay marriage.
Polls indicate that the country is 鈥渆volving鈥� on the issue at least as rapidly as Mr. Obama last year said he was. In California, a new Field Poll has California voters approving of same-sex marriage by a margin of nearly 2 to 1 (61 percent to 32 percent).
鈥淭his represents a complete reversal in views about the issue from 1977, when The Field Poll conducted its first survey on this topic, and is the highest level of support ever measured by the poll,鈥� the organization reported this week. 鈥淎pproval of allowing marriage between two people of the same gender includes majorities of men and women, voters in all racial and ethnic groups, and Californians living in each of the major regions of the state. The only subgroups where majorities remain opposed are registered聽Republicans and voters who classify themselves as conservative in politics.鈥�
The Republicans who filed a friend of the court brief in the DOMA case before the Supreme Court examined their deeply held convictions about the basis for marriage. In the end, they concluded, 鈥淭here is no legitimate, fact-based reason for denying same-sex couples the same recognition in law that is available to opposite-sex couples,鈥� and they found that 鈥渕arriage is strengthened, not undermined,聽and its benefits and importance to society as well as the support and stability it gives to children and聽families promoted, not undercut, by providing access to civil marriage for same-sex couples.鈥�
One of those who signed on to the brief was David Frum, former speechwriter for George W. Bush.
鈥淎s a conservative聽concerned with stabilizing聽families to rely less on government aid, I have been convinced: I've been聽worrying聽about the wrong thing,鈥� he wrote this week on the Daily Beast.聽鈥淪topping same-sex marriages does nothing to support聽families聽battered by economic adversity. Instead, it excludes and聽punishes people who seek only to live as conservatives would urge them to live. Treating same-sex partnerships differently from husband-wife marriages only serves to divide and antagonize those who ought to be working together.鈥�
Other elements of US society have weighed in similarly.
In their legal brief regarding DOMA, a group of some 200 businesses and government entities said the federal law 鈥減uts us, as employers, to unnecessary cost and administrative complexity鈥� while also 鈥淸forcing] us to treat one class of our lawfully married employees differently than another, when our success depends upon the welfare and morale of all employees.鈥�
The group includes such corporate giants as Amazon, Apple, Cisco Systems, eBay, Ernst & Young, Goldman Sachs, Google, Levi Strauss, Marriott International, McGraw-Hill, and Microsoft.
In a New York Times op-ed column last year, Institute for American 海角大神 founder David Blankenhorn (who had supported Prop. 8鈥檚 ban on gay marriage) explained his change in view.
鈥淎s a marriage advocate, the time has come for me to accept gay marriage and emphasize the good that it can do,鈥� he wrote. 鈥淚nstead of fighting gay marriage, I鈥檇 like to help build new coalitions bringing together gays who want to strengthen marriage with straight people who want to do the same.鈥�
