Ring of extremism

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To those who think the endangered species known as the Liberal Republican has become extinct, please take a look at their laboratory of social engineering: the Supreme Court of the People's Republic of Massachusetts.

Largely appointed by a string of constitutionally lackadaisical Republican governors, these judges have bowed their heads like puppies waiting to be petted by the national press, ruling 4-3 that the cramped institution of marriage as we've known it through millennia is no longer socially useful. In fact, it's downright discriminatory, Bull Connor in a bad tuxedo. Pull back the velvet curtain as they introduce "gay marriage."

Predictably, our national media greeted the news with their usual hosannas for the homosexual revolution. Newspapers everywhere featured the homosexual plaintiffs in Massachusetts in embraces of celebration. The political battle was between "gay activists" (no ideology there?) and "conservatives." Unlike partial-birth abortion stories, no one feels the compulsion to add quote marks, or "so-called," or "what proponents call," as the liberal linguists twist the dictionary definition of marriage.

At Newsweek, they used a less-than-neutral quote for their headline: " 'My mommies can marry.' " Wire services popped their corks with the usual words, a "historic," and yes, "landmark" decision. This is now so common in judicial circles that stricter constructionists now call it "landmarkism" -- the spectacle of judges stretching constitutions into Silly Putty in a bid to be hailed as the next Historic Liberator.

What the journalists would not discuss was the obvious concept parading down the street: judicial activism trampling the democratic process. Ten years ago, the Supreme Court of Hawaii did the same thing, finding the "right to gay marriage" in some marginal penumbra, but then the voters of Hawaii (and now 36 other states) responded by pushing for defense-of-marriage amendments.

Reporters ought to put down their pompoms long enough to take a hard look at some polls. NBC's Jim Avila noted the Pew poll that Republican voters overwhelmingly oppose what proponents call "gay marriage" by almost 80 percent. Democrats are split down the middle: 48 percent opposed, 46 percent in favor.

But Mr. Avila failed to note how the leaders of the Democrats -- the Party of Gay Pandering -- are looking at a very bumpy road. That same Pew poll showed opposition is highest among rural residents (against by 69 to 22 percent). But candidates and consultants also better notice the resistance of the majority of those in suburbs (54 to 38 percent against) and urban areas (52 to 36 percent against). Or look at the minority opinion, since Democrats think minorities are in their back pocket. A Wirthlin poll from last spring for the Alliance for Marriage found 63 percent of Hispanics and 62 percent of blacks favored a constitutional amendment defending marriage.

But the polling news gets even worse when you consider which side has more passion, more fire. Pew reported that among those who oppose the idea, nearly 6 in 10 say they feel strongly about it (35 percent of the total population express this view). Among those who favor "gay marriage," fewer than 3 in 10 say they strongly support the proposal (9 percent of the total). Eighty percent of churchgoers oppose "gay marriage," and there are a lot more churchgoers in America than there are homosexuals.

So the Democratic establishment is disco dancing on the barricades of the extreme. They're not the only ones. Liberal reporters are clueless on all the opposition. Old Newsweek hand Evan Thomas confessed, "I really don't get this whole debate... anything that promotes commitment between couples, and helps the institution of the family, is a positive thing."

From this left-wing corner, beware of the labeling games to come, where enacting 95 percent of the gay-left agenda makes you a "moderate." On his report, NBC's Mr. Avila split the Democrats between "liberals" like pro-gay purist Dennis Kucinich and "moderates, like Richard Gephardt, who stopped short of backing gay marriage." If Newt Gingrich had said in the 1990s that he only wanted to slice 95 percent of Medicare spending, would they call him a "moderate," too?

As the courts of ultraliberal states seek to impose their immorality on society, liberals ought to be preparing for the backlash, for their pendulum is swinging way too far to the left.

It's judicial legislating like this decision that says to the average God-fearing American that liberals are not simply for the separation of church and state. They are for the separation of church and society, pouring acid on our spiritual foundations, masking their contempt for God in their preaching for moral equivalence. They believe extremism in the defense of sin is no vice, and never mind the consequences.

L. Brent Bozell III is the president of the Media Research Center and a nationally syndicated columnist.