As noted earlier today, conservatives are
really bristling at the notion that they're bigots for, among other things, opposing marriage equality. The video above features top Romney adviser Stuart Stevens trying to explain why Republicans aren't bigoted, and why, this isn't a Republican-Democrat issue anyway!
STUART STEVENS: First, I think we have to say, 200 hours ago, Hillary Clinton hadn’t announced that she was for gay marriage. The 2008 Democratic platform that Barack Obama ran on was not for gay marriage. So I think it’s good to take a step back and look at where the country is on this and where people are thinking about it and looking into their hearts and coming to a decision. I think to try to divide this between political lines is really the wrong way to go. And it’s clearly not a party issue when you have Hillary Clinton following Rob Portman. I don’t think people are looking at it as an R and D issue.
A total of 48 Senate Democrats support equality, while just two Republicans do. It's even more lopsided in the House. It's the House Republicans who are bankrolling the legal defense of DOMA. It's conservative groups funding anti-equality efforts. It's Republicans who put anti-gay
initiatives on the ballot throughout the 2000s in order to spike conservative turnout.
Democrats may have been wary of jumping the gun on equality, but their party platforms didn't oppose it. The GOP's did. In fact, their anti-gay language was written by chief bigot Tony Perkins himself.
Now I get it, Stevens doesn't want his party to own the bigot language, but Democrats weren't bigoted. They might've been scared, or indifferent, or timid, but the fact that Sen. Rob Portman ended up with a gay son doesn't suddenly make enlightenment a bipartisan affair, nor bigotry for that matter.