Today, the Minnesota State Senate voted to put a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage on the November 2012 ballot by a margin of 38 - 27. Adam Bink monitored the debate and the vote. The House is expected to follow suit.
By this action, Minnesota GOPers, who took control of the House and Senate last November, could be guaranteeing a massive turnout of young voters. And, they've probably sealed their fate with those voters for decades. The GOP wants to be the party of hate and homophobia. That's so 2004. It might work with teabaggers, but rational people, particularly younger voters, want nothing to do with it.
Last month, Nate Silver reported that opponents of marriage are now in the minority -- and the numbers are moving our way, fast:
But Republican candidates, who have placed less emphasis on gay marriage in recent years, probably cannot expect their opposition to it to be a net electoral positive for them except in select circumstances. If support for gay marriage were to continue accelerating as fast as it has in the past two years, supporters would outnumber opponents roughly 56-40 in the general population by November 2012.We know the opponents of marriage will turn out. They tend to be older voters who show up. Now, young people have a reason to show up.
Via Minnesota Independent, a couple of old polls give a sense of the lay of the land::
A 2009 Star Tribune poll found that only 33 percent of Minnesotans wanted a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage, 35 percent said leave it to the courts, and 25 percent backed legalizing same-sex marriage.But, as Nate Silver noted, those numbers are changing fast. I didn't see a breakdown by age, but the numbers from the Washington Post poll from Virginia gives a sense of where young people are on the issue:
The survey shows that nearly three-quarters of those ages 18 to 29 say gays should be able to legally wed.Now, it would help if Obama was actually pro-marriage. But, as we know, he's still "evolving."
You have to think that Obama campaign manager Jim Messina is worried about turning out the youth vote in 2012. The enthusiasm from 2008 no longer exists. But, in Minnesota at least, Republicans may have done Messina a huge favor.
