...the REAL reason for the Gay Marriage Amendment.
For the following, allow me the following fairly simplistic premise: There are three groups of voters... folks who won't ever vote for Republicans... folks who won't ever vote for Democrats... the swing voters who can move back and forth. Let's assume for the moment that the first two groups are fairly even and the last group will decide the election and in 2000 this group was also split fairly even. We have a 50/50 electorate.
So, what's happened since then...
I can't think of one thing (please correct me if I'm wrong) that the President has done that will pull either the "never vote for a Republicans" or "the swing voters that chose Gore" over to the other side. Not ONE thing.
But there seem to be no less than a dozen things that might make "the swing voters who chose Bush" decide that they'll go another direction. Simply having a record changes the equation, but we all know the long list of utter disasters starting with and staring... JOB LOSS.
So from this starting place... with a fifty/fifty electorate that is sure to tip against him, Bush realizes he had to CREATE NEW VOTERS. The Gay Marriage Amendment is there solely to rouse fundamentalists who wouldn't go for a "compassionate conservative."
Even if it works, you gotta believe it piss of as many people as it will inspire.
He's in trouble. His people know it. All the money in the world shouldn't change that fact.