Jason West is my new hero, Spitzer balks

West is the 26 year old mayor of New Paltz, NY. Here's a brief history and bio info. http://tinyurl.com/3ge3u  He's facing criminal charges for marrying same-sex couples.  He's proceeding on his belief that doing so is the moral thing to do and is permissible under NY law:

It's my opinion that it's the Department of Health that's breaking the law in refusing to issue same-sex marriage licenses to same-sex couples," West said. "The laws governing marriage in New York state are gender-neutral, and the constitution of New York requires equal protection under those laws."
http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/Northeast/03/02/ny.samesex.marriage/index.html

Unfortunately, Elliot Spitzer, who has a lot of fans here at dkos (I'm a criminal defense atty so I generally have no great admiration for prosecutors but he's not a horrible one from the little I know of him) just backed up Pataki on this one, despite some noises to the contrary earlier.  CNN just announced that Spitzer says the NY law, since it defines marriage as between "brides," "grooms," "husbands," and "wives" precludes gay marriage.  Apparently he did express some concern about the equal protection implications of his decision.  The CNN talking head suggested that criminal charges against West (who appears in crt tonight) and presumably against the mayor of Nyack, if he follows suit, are pushing the envelope.  

Anybody know if there's a legal defense fund for West?  

Also, CNN is reporting a large line in Portland, OR as they've begun to issue marriage licenses.  So nice to see people empowered to stand up for what is right.