Considering the Bush administration's record with respect to civil rights issues, the fact that they are promoting a worthless, but politically expedient, amendment to the Constitution to ban gay marriage should come as no surprise to any of us. However, you'd think their own brand spanking new Spokesman-in-Chief, Tony Snow, would at least have a passing familiarity with the meaning of the term. You'd think that, but, alas, you'd be wrong (via RAW STORY):

At the White House press briefing today, Bush press secretary Tony Snow signaled that Bush considers an amendment barring same-sex marriage a "civil rights" matter, then stumbled when asked to define civil rights, RAW STORY has found.

That's right. An amendment to the Constitution to legally discriminate against a particular group of Americans is a civil rights measure in the eyes of the Bush administration. No doubt that sort of oymoronic prevarication plays well with the Republican right wing base, but let me ask Tony this question (and I'll make it easy for him by using a very simple example):

If I, as the representative of the government, physically remove a mother (let's call her "Bad Mom") from her child (i.e., "Bad Kid"), and then tell Bad Kid that she can never see her mother again because she's such a bad kid, and her Mom's such a bad mom, that they don't deserve to be mother and child any longer, have I extended rights to anyone?

In the above hypothetical, Bad Kid is deprived of her mother, Bad Mom is deprived of her child, and all the other mothers and children in the world are unaffected one way or the other. At least, as long as they are not like Bad Mom and Bad Kid, that is.

Correct me if I'm off base here, but where I come from rights are something a person is entitled to do, or something that either the Government and/or other people cannot prohibit a person from doing. Civil rights don't have anything to do with preserving the institution of motherhood, or, to think of another example, the institution of marriage. Rights protect individuals, not holy sacraments.

So, when you ban homosexuals from marrying the people they love, you aren't granting anyone any rights. All you are doing is besmirching the Constitution, and in particular the principle established by the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.

In effect, the proposed amendment, by forever banning gay marriage under the Constitution, would provide that certain people (i.e., those who wish to marry a person of the same gender) are a lesser class of persons who are not entitled to marry the people whom they choose to love. Such an amendment can only be viewed as a measure depriving a specific minority (homosexuals) of whatever marriage rights they have under existing state law. It would clearly mandate unequal treatment of those American citizens under the Constitution. Calling it a civil rights measure is insulting to anyone with half a brain.

In any case, a video link to Tony Blow's remarks can be found HERE. A transcript of his remarks follows below the fold.