> But then, round about the 92-94 timeframe, the religious wing of the party kind of woke up and decided they needed more power. And they got it. And pretty much ever since then, I've been extremely dubious of the GOP. Suddenly things that seem to be to be non-issues or fringe issues are major, all-encompassing issues. Like, for instance, gay marriage. Personally, I'm baffled that this is even an issue. I don't see how you can honestly object to allowing gays the right to get married except on the grounds of "it's against my religion/what I was taught to believe in/common decency!", none of which are good reasons for restricting the rights of a group of people. But suddenly it's part of the GOP agenda to get marriage defined as the union between one man and one woman. WTF?

An interesting thing to consider is that this is probably the same timeframe that the Democrats started to head south. Their reaction to the GOP embracing the religious wing was to pretty much reject it, thus helping to make these issues even more volatile. This is a big reason why the Democrats have been battered in the South the last two elections. This is very different from the Democratic Party of the past. Whether or not you agree with people's reasons for voting the way they do, it seems fairly obvious that the Demos didn't figure out how to change the minds of voters who might come their way. When you apparently have two extremes, there won't be much change on either side.

Fer"They're all a bunch of lying liars, anyway"rick