The fact that the President endorsing same-sex marriage has not hurt him one blip in the polls is a huge victory for us.
The conventional wisdom was, as I wrote in my Daily Beast piece last week, that embracing gay rights at the national level didn't benefit Democrats outside of a small constituency, and might actually hurt them at the polls. Then, over DADT was repealed and nothing happened, and now the President endorses marriage equality and nothing happened. As I wrote in the piece:
Gay rights switched from being perceived as an albatross around the necks of national Democrats to an issue that could galvanize the party’s base.Suddenly, Democratic politicians are realizing that there isn't much of a downside, at the national level, for supporting, and following through on, our civil rights.
Here's a new NBC/WSJ poll via First Read:
In the poll, a combined 17 percent say it makes them "much more likely" or "somewhat more likely" they will vote for him. That's compared with a combined 20 percent who say the announcement will make them more likely to vote for Mitt Romney, who opposes gay marriage.
Perhaps more importantly, 62 percent say the president's support for gay marriage doesn't make a difference in their vote -- including 75 percent of independents, 76 percent of moderates, 81 percent of African Americans, and 65 percent of residents in the Midwest.
