Alan: Video clip can be accessed at http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57574488/stunner-sen-rob-portman-backs-same-sex-marriage/
WASHINGTON-- Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, a co-sponsor of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), now supports same-sex marriage, he announced late last night.
Portman, who was at one point considered a top contender to be Mitt Romney's running mate in the 2012 presidential election, announced his reversal in an interview last night with CNN's Dana Bash. He also wrote about the decision in anop-ed this morning for the Columbia Dispatch.
"I have come to believe that if two people are prepared to make a lifetime commitment to love and care for each other in good times and in bad, the government shouldn't deny them the opportunity to get married," he said.
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Portman said his evolution on the subject began in 2011 when his son, Will, then a freshman at Yale University, told his parents he was gay.
"My son came to Jane, my wife, and I, told us that he was gay, and that it was not a choice, and that it's just part of who he is, and that's who he'd been that way for as long as he could remember," Portman told CNN.
At that point, he began to view the issue "from a new perspective, and that's of a dad who loves his son a lot and wants him to have the same opportunities that his brother and sister would have -- to have a relationship like Jane and I have had for over 26 years," he said, according to the Dispatch.
"If anything, I'm even more proud of the way he has handled the whole situation," he said. "He's an amazing young man."
The Supreme Court is slated to hear arguments on a challenge to DOMA, which defines marriage as between a man and a woman and bars federal recognition of same-sex marriage, next week.
"Well-intentioned people can disagree on the question of marriage for gay couples, and maintaining religious freedom is as important as pursuing civil marriage rights. For example, I believe that no law should force religious institutions to perform weddings or recognize marriages they don't approve of," Portman wrote in the Dispatch. "One way to look at it is that gay couples' desire to marry doesn't amount to a threat but rather a tribute to marriage, and a potential source of renewed strength for the institution."
Rob Portman and the Politics of Narcissism
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Posted Friday, March 15, 2013
Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio
Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
I'm glad that Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio has reconsidered his view on gay marriage upon realization that his son is gay, but I also find this particular window into moderation—memorably dubbed Miss America conservatism by Mark Schmitt—to be the most annoying form.
Remember when Sarah Palin was running for vice president on a platform of tax cuts and reduced spending? But there was one form of domestic social spending she liked to champion? Spending on disabled children? Because she had a disabled child personally? Yet somehow her personal experience with disability didn't lead her to any conclusions about the millions of mothers simply struggling to raise children in conditions of general poorness. Rob Portman doesn't have a son with a pre-existing medical condition who's locked out of the health insurance market. Rob Portman doesn't have a son engaged in peasant agriculture whose livelihood is likely to be wiped out by climate change. Rob Portman doesn't have a son who'll be malnourished if SNAP benefits are cut. So Rob Portman doesn't care.
It's a great strength of the movement for gay political equality that lots of important and influential people happen to have gay children. That obviously does change people's thinking. And good for them.
But if Portman can turn around on one issue once he realizes how it touches his family personally, shouldn't he take some time to think about how he might feel about other issues that don't happen to touch him personally? Obviously the answers to complicated public policy questions don't just directly fall out of the emotion of compassion. But what Portman is telling us here is that on this one issue, his previous position was driven by a lack of compassion and empathy. Once he looked at the issue through his son's eyes, he realized he was wrong. Shouldn't that lead to some broader soul-searching? Is it just a coincidence that his son is gay, and also gay rights is the one issue on which a lack of empathy was leading him astray? That, it seems to me, would be a pretty remarkable coincidence. The great challenge for a senator isn't to go to Washington and represent the problems of his own family. It's to try to obtain the intellectual and moral perspective necessary to represent the problems of the people who don't have direct access to the corridors of power.
Senators basically never have poor kids. That's something members of Congress should think about. Especially members of Congress who know personally that realizing an issue affects their own children changes their thinking.