If your enemy is exploding, it's a wise move to step back.
Which isn't to say it isn't fun—and smart politics—to toss a little gasoline on the fire.
Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton continues to demonstrate strong leadership uniting his party against the gay marriage-banning Constitutional amendment that will be presented to voters in Nov. 2012. In May, when the Republicans passed it out of the House, he held a purely symbolic, but very public veto ceremony for the press.
Now Dayton has boarded the Schadenfreude Express rolling over disgraced adulteress/family values champion, former Republican Minnesota Senate Majority Leader Amy Koch. Koch helped push an amendment defining marriage as being between a man and a woman and her loyal, attack-dog subordinate staffer. [Language redacted in committee.]
Dayton is diplomatic on how the GOP should move forward from the Koch debacle, acknowledging the mess is for the Senate chamber and Republican party to clean up. He does twist the hypocrisy knife on the topic of their zeal to "protect the sanctity of marriage." In a Minnesota Public Radio interview, via Think Progress:
“I think it underscores that sanctity of marriage is important to most Minnesotans and people who are in same-sex relationships believe in that sanctity also and want a chance to participate in the sanctity in the same way as heterosexual couples.”
Well, I can't speak for the whole gay community, but I might personally tinker with Amy Koch's version of a good, Chrisitian-sanctified marriage, just a little.
The current situation is looking pretty dim for the MN GOP prospects in 2012, from a variety of metrics. It certainly isn't clear the amendment will be a plus for moving GOP voters to the polls next November. It might be more of an anchor than balloon. Democrats seem to be noticing this. Former Democratic MN House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher made a suggestion on another program that Republicans should to abandon this fight and repeal the amendment intiative legislatively, as they have lost all creditability. Dayton said he'd love to see that, and added:
I will say, before you take out the speck in your neighbor’s eye, take the log out of your own eye. Somebody whose conduct doesn’t measure up to what they’re professing to believe in or prescribing for others, then they should be called on that.
And I think calling out family values hypocrites is exactly what Governor Dayton just did.
Well played, sir. This isn't Amy Koch's first "Oh snap!" moment of the week. This apology from the gay community to Mrs. Koch for ruining her marriage has gone deliriously viral in the last 24 hours.
Sucks to be hoisted on your own petard, huh, Mrs. Koch?