Marco.org

The New York Times:

“At a certain point, I’ve just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same-sex couples should be able to get married,” Mr. Obama told ABC News in an interview that came after the president faced mounting pressure to clarify his position.

Mr. Obama said his views had changed over the years, in part because of prodding from friends who are gay and conversations with his wife and daughters.

“I had hesitated on gay marriage in part because I thought that civil unions would be sufficient,” Mr. Obama said. “I was sensitive to the fact that for a lot of people, the word marriage was something that invokes very powerful traditions and religious beliefs.”

This is certainly progress and worthy of celebration. But does it disappoint anyone else that he was so obviously holding it back all this time because he didn’t want to offend all of the bigots?

His statements are couched in so much equivocation and accommodation that it’s barely an endorsement. And it’s easy to question his motives as he finally says something to energize Democratic voters a few months before his re-election campaign.

It doesn’t feel sincere: rather, it feels like the good-politician move of just telling people whatever they want to hear to maximize campaign contributions and keep themselves in office.

And for such an important social and civil-rights issue, that’s just not enough.