Huntsman: Republicans Should Embrace Gay Marriage

[Capt. Obvious]

Former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman on Thursday urged the Republican Party to embrace marriage equality, calling it a conservative cause that the GOP needs to champion in order to maintain its appeal to the American electorate.

"The party of Lincoln should stand with our best tradition of equality and support full civil marriage for all Americans," the former Republican presidential candidate wrote in an op-ed in the American Conservative magazine.

"This is both the right thing to do and will better allow us to confront the real choice our country is facing: a choice between the Founders’ vision of a limited government that empowers free markets, with a level playing field giving opportunity to all, and a world of crony capitalism and rent-seeking by the most powerful economic interests," he wrote.

Americans will not coalesce around Republicans' free market ideas, Huntsman argued, "if we stand against their friends, family, and individual liberty."

http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entry/huntsman-republicans-should-embrace-gay-marriage

[EOTE]

1. NOW he says this?

Now that it's clear the tides are turning in favor of gay marriage. He's not saying this because the government shouldn't be telling which consenting adults can or can't marry, he's saying this because republicans look more and more like ignorant jackasses every day. And republicans have the fucking gall to say they're for limited government. They're for limited government unless the government can stop people from doing things they find icky. If a more hypocritical, ignorant and evil creature than the modern republican exists on this planet, I sure as hell haven't seen it.

[joeybee12]

2. He shuld have come out in favor of it during the primary...he got like 0%

of the vote...obviously supporting it then would not have cost him any votes!

[EOTE]

5. Finally a republican who doesn't love big government intruding on civil liberties.

Republicans always say they want a smaller government, but the only civil liberty they consistently support is gun ownership. It's nice to see one republican coming out in favor of rights, but these things ring so hollow when republicans have been persecuting gays and other minorities for decades.

[joeybee12]

6. But they do also lovebig government inside a woman's womb also...

They don't see the hypocrisy of crying less government, but wanted more when it infringes on individual rights.

[EOTE]

8. "End big government" is a slogan for republicans, it doesn't really mean anything.

It just allows their mindless followers to have something positive to say. As you say, they're all for big government when it comes to women's bodies or telling us who can marry whom. Republicans don't believe in civil liberties OR the separation of church and state. It seems to me they're pretty anti-American.

[joeybee12]

9. It's a campaign slogan, nothing more, like you said...nt

[DonViejo]

3. Looks like Huntsman has evolved...

he's gone from favoring civil unions to now favoring gay marriage, kind of like the President. The issue of gay marriage is going to be even more widely discussed over the course of the next month, the Supremes will be hearing the case(s) in late March.

Even dip-stick Newt Gingrich has evolved:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022053835

[EOTE]

4. Huntsman is one of the most moderate republicans out there today.

He was, without a doubt, the most "rational" and moderate of the candidates for the republican nomination. In spite of this, he's JUST NOW coming to the conclusion that consenting adults don't need the government telling them who they can marry. I don't consider this an evolution, I consider it a man realizing how incredibly irrelevant his party has become.

[DonViejo]

7. That was obviously his position when he...

favored civil unions, he's now seen the light, "duh, the same reasoning applies to marriage."

[davidn3600]

10. This guy would give Democrats major problems if he were able to win the GOP nomination

[11 Bravo]

11. Too bad he couldn't see his way clear to say this when he was actually relevant.