For the love of a daughter:Repub. Mayor Jerry Sanders supporting gay marriage

[pnwmom]

http://www.salon.com/opinion/walsh/politics/2007/09/20/jerry_sanders_video/

"This is the way necessary social change happens. It starts out unthinkable, and then one day it's inevitable.

"I'm not going to spend much time describing San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders' statement about why he changed his mind and supports gay marriage. Watch the video, below. (Don't watch it if you can't afford to have a good cry this afternoon.) Sanders, a Republican, explains that he planned to veto a City Council resolution supporting efforts to overturn California's ban on gay marriage, but he changed his mind when the resolution reached his desk. Things get dramatic at about 1:55 in the video."

SNIP

[Wapsie B]

1. That is great news!

Now to have someone in the Deep South and rural Midwest come out and do the same thing and I'd say we've got some progress on this issue.

[pnwmom]

2. Did you watch the video? It IS quite moving.

Maybe some Republicans still have a heart after all . . .

[Wapsie B]

10. Yes it is very moving.

Those who still have a heart need to take their party back.

[MasonJar]

11. San Diego is the deep South, believe me.

[rinsd]

3. Big K&R

He's still a Republican in far too many ways but today I was very proud of him.

[tandot]

4. K & R.

I can't watch the video right now.

[me b zola]

5. I saw the story earlier today on one of the cable news shows

Good on him for choosing decency over his party's hatred. :thumbsup:

[malaise]

7. That was not his position last week according to the cable report

so I suspect someone called him on it. All the same the video was moving.

[pnwmom]

14. He says in the video that he was still planning the day before

to veto it.

Someone may have called him on it. Or maybe he couldn't stop thinking about his daughter. None of us can know.

[malaise]

18. Whatever he finally did the right thing

If two people want to be together, I don't see how that affects my marriage.

[frogmarch]

6. The ONLY reason

Sanders is supporting gay marriage is because his daughter is a lesbian, and he wants her to have the right to marry her partner if she wants to, because he wants his daughter to be happy. It's all about his daughter, not about lesbians and gays in general. Anyone think he'd support gay marriage if his beloved daughter wasn't a lesbian? Fat chance.

Sanders is a just another run-of-the-mill republican asshole.

[Orsino]

8. I'm glad he can be moved...

...but this calls into question his ability to empathize with constituents who aren't related to him. Is he also unqualified to legislate on Welfare because no one in his family is on it? Can he be trusted to oversee public education if his kids attend private school?

They are not of us.

[goodgd_yall]

12. I don't really think it can be assumed to be his only reason

I think through his daughter he was able to be educated about the LGBT community and that is why he had a change of heart.

[pnwmom]

13. P-flag recognizes that that's how MANY if not most people come to

support gay rights -- they come to realize that someone they know well or love is gay.

You didn't see it happen to Cheney, though, did you? Sanders is 100 times the father Cheney is.

[Pacifist Patriot]

16. Amen

[JohnnyLib2]

19. Amen again.

I've sure seen that happen.

[Pacifist Patriot]

15. I agree, but....

as more and more people see those they love hurt by discriminatory laws the better off we will all be. It is pathetic he couldn't see it before it hit close to home, but at least it did.

My church ends up with new members because after years of hearing their pastors rail against homosexuality they cannot reconcile those teachings with their feelings about their beloved aunt, uncle, sister, brother, cousin....etc. when they come out of the closet.

What would our society be like if every run-of-the-mill Republican asshole had a beloved relative they suddenly saw as a living, breathing, caring human being rather than regarded as "other?" I'll take such epiphanies whenever and wherever they come.

[goodgd_yall]

9. Very inspiring n/t

[gateley]

17. K&R -- He's person before he's a Repug. Glad he remembered that. nt