Tuesday 3 August 2010

The NOM Bus (crash) Tour, and Iowa

The disastrous bus smash that is NOM's tour around the country has reached Iowa. Box Turtle Bulletin has a report, noting the age of participants in the NOM rally, and also noting that here as elsewhere, the marriage supporters drew a larger crowd than opponents. 








This could seem remarkable, here in this rural, mid- western state where passions were so inflamed by last year's court judgement. But it will not have surprised anyone who has been watching the polls, as I have, ever since. This is the comment I posted on the site:



It’s worth reflecting on the record of opposition in Iowa since the court judgement was handed down. Immediately afterwards, opinion polls showed clearly that most Iowans were opposed – and immediately there were loud calls to start the process towards changing the state constitution.
Some months later, an important poll showed that Iowans remained opposed – but did not want the constitution tinkered with. The most recent poll showed that most Iowans now support marriage equality.
In two election cycles – one special election last year, and in this year’s GOP primaries for the state legislature, NOM poured money into campaigns for candidates promising to initiate a ballot to overturn marriage equality – and reports were that their candidates lost big time.
In Iowa, NOM has lost already, and marriage is safe.
More generally, this example shows that even in the rural mid-west, once people have lived with marriage equality for a while, they get used to it and get on with their lives – just as they did earlier with interracial marriage.

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