April Fool

Pat Buchanan Doused with Salad Dressing.

The real Fools are the Religious Conservative who the GOP is playing for fools.

As a supporter of gay rights, I'm happy that Bush hasn't pushed the issue. But why aren't the leaders of the Christian conservative movement, who regard gay marriage as a threat to Western civilization, unhappy? The answer is that they've been co-opted. Republicans will help the social conservative cause but rarely spend any political capital on it. Take the Schiavo case, which supposedly demonstrates the social conservatives' power. Sure, Bush flew across the country to sign a bill "protecting" her. But as soon as polls showed the public disapproved of Washington's intervention, Bush dropped the issue like a hot potato.

The main social conservative groups exist mainly to persuade rank-and-file social conservatives to support an agenda to which they have no natural allegiance. High on the Christian Coalition's list of its top legislative priorities, for instance, are cutting taxes (No. 2) and privatizing Social Security (No. 4), two issues that did not receive heavy emphasis in the Sermon on the Mount. Their top issue — confirming Bush's judicial nominees — does have a social angle. But in point of fact, conservative judges have been far more aggressive in overturning regulations on business than in turning back the clock on abortion or gay rights. That's why business groups have raised millions of dollars to help confirm Bush's judges.

I suspect that, behind closed doors, most Washington Republicans take religious conservatives for suckers.

Social Conservatives will never win on their issues, no matter how many Republicans they help elect. The culture is passing them by and the GOP can't do a thing about the culture. So the religious right marches to polls, the gays don't go away and every year it becomes a little harder to make ends meet. Every government institution that supports the middle class is slowly ground up, Sin City becomes the number one movie in America and struggling religious conservative wonder why if Bush and Delay have all the power, why are their lives getting harder? Suckers.