Bloodless Coup

Byrd!? Really!?

I don't pretend to know him terribly well, but I would have thought he'd have voted against it, like McCain, like Cheney (were he to vote, based on prior comments), because it's not appropriate fodder for a constitutional amendment by the dictates of any non-Christian-enslaved formulation of conservativsm.

Has he commented on his thinking?

My solution in they-both-suck Senate races (in my home state, this is J. Kerry vs anyone) is to write in Baltar's name. I highly recommend this approach.

Well I do greatly prefer Baltar to Byrd.

Byrd's always been more anti-gay than any other Democratic senator (well, maybe not Ben Nelson, or as George W calls him, "Nellie"), so his vote could come from that. Or it could come from the fact that Raese supported this amendment too. But I haven't seen any explanation from his office yet.

I can't really vote for Raese, I guess. I mean if he was the face of the GOP we'd be looking at a situation in which the country lurched far, far to the left in response to people like him. But - well I guess at this point I'm still likely to skip this race when I get my ballot.

But I hope that his desire to put this claptrap in the constitution will earn more digs at Byrd for his supposed reverence for that document. I'd have a hard time thinking of a matter that's less appropriate to be added to it, no matter how one might personally feel about gay marriage.

your last two sentences were really the essence of my point. i just really don't get it, regardless of what state he represents, or his legacy on discrete social topics of a more conservative orientation.

Btw, three other names stuck out to me when I was looking at who voted how. 1) Why the hell did Lisa Murkowski vote for it? Is Alaska up in arms about the gays? I really wouldn't have though so - they've always seemed to me more libertarian types - and since she's already labeled a "moderate" for her abortion positions ... well, I just don't see why she felt the need to support it. 2) Ditto John Warner - he's secure and I really didn't think he'd side with Dobson, Sheldon, etc. in this fight to almost redefine what should and shouldn't be constitutional issues. He's shown courage against their extremes before. And somewhat similarly 3) I get more and more impressed with John Sununu all the time. Of course his politics aren't my politics. But he seems bright, a workhouse, not a complete shill for ugly extremists. The more I read about him the more I think he's got a significant future in front of him.

I really hate to defend Byrd, since personally I plan to join Armand in abstaining in this election (I was pushed over the edge by the Scalito vote), but this vote was not actually on the Amendment itself, but rather a cloture vote on whether to vote directly on the amendment. According to Byrd on the record, he wanted to give it a straight up and down vote, but "opposes the amendment itself."

Although I'm sure the more redneck members of his constituency will fail to understand this nuance. (not sure I buy it myself.)

I don't buy that for one second - everyone knew this was going to fall far short of 60 votes, which means that in 2006 political discourse this is the only vote that really mattered on this issue. Whether or not you favored or opposed the amendment would be definied by this vote - not some mythical vote Byrd would supposedly have rather been allowed to have.

He can use that excuse as a fig-leaf explanation to defend himself to certain potential donors and other opponents of the amendment, without having to take a clear-cut stand - but this bears all the hallmarks of sad political pandering to the basest of emotions and people who are basically cretins. But then that's not a new thing for Byrd.

and we all know how well the i-voted-for-it-before-i-voted-against-it meme plays.

Byrd - shit