Daily Beast: “What a difference a decade makes. That’s when Karl Rove weaponized the issue during his boss’s 2004 presidential campaign, shamefully putting marriage discrimination on state ballots in an effort to turn out base support. Countless Republican candidates in federal and state elections followed that blueprint in the next three cycles, using opposition as red meat to try to draw out base voters.
“But times have changed… Whoever seeks the Democratic nomination will embrace the freedom to marry. Support is now part of the party’s DNA (which, by the way, was not the case in the last primary). And new evidence shows the cause is a turnout motivator for Democratic base voters.”
“The Republican approach will be more interesting. Candidates will be figuring out whether to use the old formula and appeal to a dwindling base of older social conservatives who turn out disproportionately in primaries. Alternatively, they could choose a different course, trying to skirt the issue through the primaries while maintaining an appeal to general election swing voters, a great majority of whom back marriage for gay couples and find discrimination objectionable.”
