The elections yesterday had some surprises, and some not too surprising results.

In the local election, the race for King County Executive was a hotly contested one between former newscaster Susan Hutchinson, and King County Council member Dow Constantine.

I found it ironic that after watching the 2008 election where Obama won by promising change from the day to day politics as usual, here in King County, the opposite held forth.  Hutchinson’s ran on a campaign of asking to end the business as usual attitude that has lead to King County’s financial messes.  Constantine on the other hand ran on a campaign of “she’s a Republican”.

Seriously, his closing comments at a debate as well as TV ads said pretty much nothing else, even trying to smear her by likening her to Sarah Palin.  It was one of the cheapest dirtiest campaign ads I have seen.

Well, that apparently is enough in Seattle; either that or a pretty woman need not apply.

The Mayor’s race is still up for grabs.  Hope and Change already  won there with incumbent Greg Nichols getting knocked off the top two primary ballot.

That alone made this a successful election to me.

Two huge wins for the Republicans and face slaps for the Democrats however were in Virginia and New Jersey, where the Republican contenders ousted their Democrat rivals, showing that even the magic of Obama was not able to carry the day.

One local initiative went down, to my disappointment, I-1033.  Despite the fear mongering by its opponents, it was a good measure.  It would have limited the State’s revenue growth to keep pace with the cost of living, and dictated that anything in excess of that had to be returned by lowering property taxes.  The campaign against used the stigma of cutting school funding to drive a fear campaign, but the measure did nothing to cut any spending at all.  It only curbed excessive spending growth.  I still fail to see why it scares people to suggest that the Government growth should be reasonable and revenue excess should be returned to the people.

The two other big issues I was watching were the local referendum R-71 and Maine’s measure to repeal the gay marriage law.

R-71 was to affirm or repeal an “everything but marriage” law passed here in Washington, that afforded gays and seniors the ability to register domestic partnerships with all the same state benefits as marriage.

Frankly, I had no problem with it with one minor exception, and that is that it excluded hetero couples under 65 from taking advantage of it.  Of of the reasons seniors wanted in was to be able to be couples but not mess up retirements and such.  I think if you open that door for those reasons, you need to let everyone in.  Gays were in a different place, having not the ability to marry, their need was understandable.  Aside from that, I figured as long as gays were satisfied, it ended the whole gay marriage debate here in this state anyway.  The people opposing this however insist that the gays will use this to spur on to the final step and legalize gay marriage.

As of this moment it is passing, which affirms the law.

In Maine though, the gay marriage law went down fairly solidly, by about 5%.  This is a major blow to gay activists.  As of now, legislative attempts to extend gay marriage has been tried in 31 states, and in all 31, the people have overturned it or voted it down.  In California’s case an extraordinary vote to create an amendment to their Constitution nail that one shut, even as other states have passed gay marriage similarly.

Now, for a moment I am not going to consider the validity of gays wanting marriage, nor am I taking an issue of the sanctity of marriage arguments.  My issue is with marriage itself, and with how society uses it as a class weapon.

The argument runs hot and heavy about the inequality of Gays not being able to marry, and while I think they make a strong case, I think the arguments ignore a fundamental fact that has become the elephant in the progressive’s room:  Ideology aside, the majority of Americans see marriage as something more important than a contract and they do not support gay marriage.  As far removed from our early conservative roots as we are, that one issue continues to be an important one.

I really can’t explain it, but it is painfully obvious.  And unfortunately the State has created a situation where the people’s voice is actually a factor.

The real problem is that instead of a church blessing a union, and recognizing it in the community, the state blesses the union and confers upon it benefits and responsibilities, although frankly these days the benefits are the greater.  The state owns marriage now, and uses it as a control tool. 

Marriage is now a commodity instead of a right.

And as long as “government” controls the benefits and the rules around marriages, then the people are going to end up partially in control of that through the democratic process.  Hot Air agrees:

The recognition of marriage is a legitimate public policy question, one that should be decided through either the legislature or by direct vote in referendums.  No one has proposed any law to ban gay relationships, and the law should not interfere with consenting, non-sanguinary adults in creating legal partnerships for property, access, and so on — the incidentals of long-term relationships.  But the people of the states have the right to determine what relationships qualify for state recognition as marriage.

Another good point regarding marriage:

As far as protecting the “institution of marriage,” though, the states gave up on that decades ago with no-fault divorce.  Marriage is the only contract that one partner can abrogate without penalty.  People would be better protected by partnership contracts, where property and child access would be decided and agreed long before problems appeared in the relationship, and leave marriage to the churches, which are much better suited to protect the institution.  Divorce is a much bigger danger to marriage than gay marriage ever will be, and the dissolution of the nuclear family a much bigger threat to the fabric of society than gays and lesbians living together.  Everyone would be better off with government out of the bedroom and the chapel — and so would marriage.

I can’t say I disagree, it is the bottom line I keep coming back to:  The government needs to get out of the marriage business.

I think in the short term Gays should spend more effort on pushing through equality measure like R-71, and forget about the word marriage.   The results are more important, that they be afford as much equality as possible.  

Yes, I admit that civil union or domestic partnership laws will never fully bridge the gap, but then again the legalized marriages in the few states that allow it do not either, as none of them can touch the Federal issues, like taxes. 

And though this alienates me from many conservatives, I also have to say that a strict reading of the intent of the US Constitution is in their favor.  Like it or not, there is an inequality there that eventually the SCOTUS will have to address, if for no other reason than because  of the fact that the Federal Tax laws are not applied consistently to the people in the states that legalize gay marriage.

It’s only a matter of time.

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