And please stop harping on Obama’s position. I don’t like it either, but if you’re going to go claiming that Cheney’s an innocent victim of “demonization”, maybe you should consider the complexities of Obama’s position. He made campaign promises regarding DADT and DOMA knowing they’d be a matter of public record regardless of what happened after the election. In 1993 when Clinton tried to end the military’s ban on homosexuals it resulted in an outcry that became a huge distraction. As distasteful as Obama’s pragmatism is, he’s still a politician, and he’s focusing on the economy and the 2010 elections. Or do you think we’d be better off with Republicans in control of Congress?

Oh, please. Someone needs to write a book on the demonization of Dick Cheney. Obama has the position that marriage should only be between a man and a woman.

Also, I can’t help wondering whether Clinton knew it was unconstitutional, whether he was being pragmatic. If it got struck down, he could say, “Well, I tried!” and surreptitiously wink at the LTBT community. So far there’s been no legal challenge to it that I know of, but I think it’s only a matter of time. And if enough states allow same-sex marriage I think there will be too much pressure on the courts, if not Congress and the White House, to repeal DOMA. The trouble is, as Tom Petty said, the waiting is the hardest part.

It’s also one of the reasons why the US Supreme Court ruled in striking down all of the states’ miscengenation laws in Loving v Virginia: because of the portability of marriage and divorces, the state HAS to recognize them made in other states.

Cheney’s just trying to make nice, but as far as *this* American’s concerned, he should be locked up for the rest of his miserable life in a dank dark dungeon being waterboarded on a random basis every day. He is a war criminal.

Dick Cheney is a monster nonetheless.

He says right in the video: “Whether or not there ought to be a federal statute to govern this, I don’t support. … This has always been a state issue.”

How are we supposed to read this? How does this compare with traditional straight marriage? There may not be any federal statues regulating traditional marriage, but as the article argues, the federal government has always deferred to the states’ regulation of marriage, and the existence of the DOMA launches the issue into the federal sphere.

So either he’s arguing that individual states should be able to allow same-sex marriage, but the federal government shouldn’t recognize those marriages — which isn’t freedom or equality at all — or he’s arguing that the federal government should be blind to the distinctions states make in regulating marriages and should support all those marriages equally … which the second part of DOMA strictly prohibits. If he’s making the second argument, why can’t he come out and say something about how at least half of DOMA needs to go? (Other than just obfuscating for political reasons, of course.)

I’m not arguing that getting a little support from someone “on the other side” isn’t better than getting no support, or that he might not have a legitimate moral dilemma he’s struggling with on the issue. I just kind of have a hard time listening to him yammer about it and get really excited about his rather contorted position.

Yes. I agree.

I wasn’t suggesting that highlighting “and also supporting DoMA” was a good correction. Rather, I was pointing out that we do not have any evidence that Cheney was “also supporting DoMA”. I was highlighting it to point out that this wording is present in your article but that it is not supported by anything.

Rather, I would have suggested that it be made clear that we don’t know that Cheney was supporting the federal ban and, in fact, it appears that he may actually hold the position that states define marriage, not the federal government, or the exact opposite of “also supporting” the federal ban portion of DoMA.

That is, after all, what he said today.

I’m hoping with the correction it’s more clear. What I care about is the overarching point — that supporting DoMA and state-level gay marriage is inconsistent. Whether it Cheney falls under this is, as you’ve shown, an open question. I do think he is avoiding a national confrontation over gay rights by not speaking out against it, at least.