Changing times
Times have changed, however, and Bush’s position has changed with them. When his poll numbers were floundering and when he was faced with increasing unhappiness from his right-wing base because of soaring deficits and liberal immigration policies, Bush came out for a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. It seemed to be a good move since the issue is one that is easy to understand and also particularly incendiary with its mix of titillating and forbidden sex and election-year politics. Bush gave red meat to his restless base and also had an issue with which to draw a line of moral demarcation between himself and his prospective Democratic candidate (Kerry at the time). By distinguishing himself from Kerry in this area, it was possible to hammer the point home that Kerry was a Massachusetts liberal who was out of touch with God-fearing, mainstream Americans. And it certainly didn’t hurt that the Massachusetts Supreme Court had ruled in favor of gay marriage, enabling the inference to be drawn that Kerry’s politics by extension were out of the mainstream. For a time, the media seemed to play right along by focusing an inordinate amount of time on the controversy to the exclusion of more pressing and more damaging issues (for Bush). From Iraq and the developing crisis in social security to the outsourcing of jobs overseas, it seemed that other issues were briefly put on the backburner while the media obsessed about whether gays should be able to marry.