In an email to members last night, the Family Research Council attacked Conan O’Brien for planning to officiate a wedding for a same-sex couple on his late night comedy show. O’Brien announced last week that he will marry a longtime staffer and his partner in New York’s Beacon Theatre. Without failing to use scare quotes, FRC noted that O’Brien is “taking advantage of the state’s new law by ‘marrying’ two of his male staffers.” The anti-gay group said that the wedding will “help our movement highlight what a sham same-sex ‘marriage’ is,” and used the event to attack the Respect for Marriage Act, the Senate bill which would repeal the discriminatory Defense of Marriage Act.
If Conan O’Brien thinks hosting a same-sex “wedding” on his show will help its popularity, the joke’s on him. To celebrate the funnyman’s one-year anniversary on TBS, “Conan” is broadcasting this week from his old neighborhood in New York City. And in a desperate move for ratings, the host is taking advantage of the state’s new law by “marrying” two of his male staffers on the program. Thanks to a free online certificate from the Universal Life Church, he can even officiate. While Conan might grab a few headlines from the ceremony, the irony of a comedian performing the ceremony–along with his joke of an ordination–is notable. If Hollywood wants to help our movement highlight what a sham same-sex “marriage” is, then late-night television is the perfect medium! O’Brien’s camp insists that the ceremony isn’t a “publicity stunt.”
You can expect the same fictitious claim in the U.S. Senate. There, liberal Democrats are doing their best to steal the spotlight on marriage by introducing a bill to redefine it. Sponsored by a former San Francisco Mayor, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), the deceptively-named “Respect for Marriage Act” would topple the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and open the federal floodgates to same-sex unions. Like us, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) shakes his head at the bill’s title. “George Orwell would have marveled at that name. A real bill to restore marriage would restore marriage as it has been known: as between one man and one woman,” Grassley said. “That is the view of marriage that I support. This bill would undermine, not restore, marriage by repealing the Defense of Marriage Act.”
The Judiciary Committee is set to consider the bill tomorrow (though it could be delayed a week), and given the committee’s Democratic majority, it will almost certainly pass. Enter the liberal media, which will bombard Americans with a wave of news about the progress of the same-sex “marriage” movement. Don’t buy it. The Judiciary Committee is widely considered the most partisan of all committees, and its 10 liberals do not represent the values of the broader Congress–or the country. Its Democratic members include: Sens. Pat Leahy (Vt.), Herb Kohl (Wisc.), the bill’s author, Dianne Feinstein (Calif.), Chuck Schumer (N.Y.), Dick Durbin (Ill.), Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.), Amy Klobuchar (Minn.), Al Franken (Minn.), Chris Coons (Del.), and Richard Blumenthal (Conn.). Not one of them scored higher than a zero percent on FRC Action’s Vote Scorecard. How’s that for extremist?
