The Supreme Court's announcement, earlier this week, that it would not review lower-court decisons, from three different circuits, holding that same-sex couples have a right to marry has been widely viewed as another in a string of significant victories for gay marriage. But the far-seeing John Hinderaker, of the determinedly ridiculous Power Line blog, understands what no one else can grasp--namely, that the conservative justices who voted to let the lower-court decisions stand are playing the proverbial "long game." The idea is that gay marriage foes would suffer a definitive defeat if the current Court ruled on a dispositve case. Too many liberals! So the idea is to put off the day of reckoning until a Republican is president and Ruth Bader Ginsburg has been replaced by someone crazy as Hinderaker.
As Alvie Singer says to his girlfriend's brother in Annie Hall, "Uh, excuse me, but I have an appointment back on Planet Earth."
It's true that Justice Ginsburg is elderly and has had serious health problems. When you've said that, you're pretty much done with the plausible part of Hinderaker's argument. I doubt a Republican will be elected president in 2016. But let's suppose one is. Heck, let's suppose that it's Ted Cruz, who lambasted the High Court's "judicial activism" after it declined to reconsider any of the lower-court decisions. (Refusing to act = activism.) Abetted by the Supremes' inaction, well over half of gay Americans now live in states allowing gay marriage. More and more are marrying, and we're still waiting on the dire consequences predicted by opponents. The percentage of Americans who support same-sex marriage continues to rise. Nevertheless, in the world according to Hinderaker, President Cruz in about 2018 is going to appoint to the Supreme Court a couple of ideologues who will then--what? In an unprecedented act of judicial restraint, unmarry all the legally married gay couples? Yes, that's the plan!
To me, it appears that gay Americans want to act like Republicans--get married, join the military--and, for unknown reasons, Republicans do not declare victory but instead persist in their Crazyhood. (It's the quality or state of being crazy.)
