McCain supports marriage between a man and a woman. He doesn't say anything about divorce or the idea that marriage should be until death do us part. Attacking McCain in this way on this issue is stupid.

"Unwed motherhood (around 30% of all children) is strongly correlated with poverty and inability to marry. Do you think that's a good thing?" -- shooter242

Is that some sort of genetic condition?

It is perfectly consistent.

McCain supports marriage between a man and a woman. He doesn't say anything about divorce or the idea that marriage should be until death do us part. Attacking McCain in this way on this issue is stupid.

-- bushwacker00

John McCain also entered the fray last night, calling the decision "a loss for the traditional family,"

You then, you think that McCain doesn't see divorce or multiple divorces and what turns out to be in some cases multiple Step Families as "a loss for the traditional family"?

When do we start talking about the fact that "marriage" is a spiritual state declared by a religion, while what couples are seeking from the State is legal recognition of their interdependent lives?

The State shouldn't be conferring the title of "marriage" to anyone. We should get legal rights through "civil union" if we want to declare our lives interdependent. If people want to be deemed married, they can go to their religious institutions for that.

It's time to separate the State from marriage - and religion. It was supposed to be that way from the beginning, this separation, and now that we're clearly a plural population, we have to stop referring to the Christian Bible as our judicial reference. Either use books from all religions/philosphies and spend the time finding common ground or use none.

McCain does not have some long tradition of depending upon Christian fundamentalists, but he desperately needs them now. His mention of traditional marriage is a bid to get that support. He knows very well what these people believe and how he must appeal to them. To assume that most of them are quite resolved to adultery and divorce followed by remarriage would be quite disingenuous on his part. None of these religions approve of adultery and many disapprove of divorce when it is followed by remarriage. To remarry is to live in a constant state of adultery. My former neighbor is Church of Christ. She divorced a husband who beat her and has lived a celibate life since. She told me that she would never remarry because of her religious beliefs.

It is cynical to try to appeal to this populace by raising the flag of traditional marriage while wearing the underwear of adultery, so to speak.

You are focusing on one of the four gospels (Mark); they don't all put the prohibition on divorce that emphatically.

"And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery," (Matt. 19:9).

Roman Catholics have virtually always followed your passage from Mark, but these days even get "Catholic divorces" via the intellectually preposterous "annulment system," in which it is determined that no marriage ever actually occurred for whatever reasons. (I could obtain such an annulment if I cared to do so, since my ex is gay. Never mind that we consummated the thing unto having three kids.)

There is no doubt that the NT hates divorce. But the absolute prohibition (which did not apply to merely divorce, but rather, to remarriage after it) has generally been a Catholic thing.

There is no doubt that the NT hates divorce. But the absolute prohibition (which did not apply to merely divorce, but rather, to remarriage after it) has generally been a Catholic thing.

Even so, McCain, like so many others, left his first wife because HE was having an affair. Regardless of any exceptions, his subsequent marriage is un-Christian. And untraditional.

Even so, McCain, like so many others, left his first wife because HE was having an affair. Regardless of any exceptions, his subsequent marriage is un-Christian. And untraditional.

Right,in his case. *He* was committing the immorality (adultery) that would allow *her* to divorce him with a clean conscience, per some of the NT. His actions were, as you say, violative of Xianity's traditional views on marriage, no matter what Gospel one turns to.

No-fault" divorce was pioneered in the United States by the state of California with the passage of the Family Law Act of 1969. The Act was signed by Governor Ronald Reagan on September 4, 1969[6], and it took effect on January 1, 1970

The conservative definition of "traditional" is whatever they define it to be.

And you'll be happy to know that they have a long tradition of defining "traditional" this way.

Thus, there is a strong conservative "civil rights tradition," which consists of using "individual rights" to bash "group rights." They adopted this position--pioneered by David Duke's "National Association for the Advancement of White People"--shortly after abandoning the previous conservative "civil rights tradition," which consisted of using "group rights" to bash "individual rights."

National Review, August 24, 1957, “Why the South Must Prevail,” (presumably written by William F. Buckley):

http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/movable_type/2005-3_archives/001467.html

The South does not want to deprive the Negro of a vote for the sake of depriving him of the vote. Political scientists assert that minorities do not vote as a unit. Women do not vote as a bloc, they contend; nor do Jews, or Catholics, or laborers, or nudists--nor do Negroes; nor will the enfranchised Negroes of the South.

If that is true, the South will not hinder the Negro from voting--why should it, if the Negro vote, like the women's, merely swells the volume, but does not affect the ratio, of the vote? In some parts of the South, the White community merely intends to prevail on any issue on which there is corporate disagreement between Negro and White. The White community will take whatever measures are necessary to make certain that it has its way.

What are the issues? Is school integration one? The NAACP and others insist that the Negroes as a unit want integrated schools. Others disagree, contending that most Negroes approve the social sepaation of the races. What if the NAACP is correct, and the matter comes to a vote in a community in which Negroes predominate? The Negroes would, according to democratic processes, win the election; but that is the kind of situation the White community will not permit. The White community will not count the marginal Negro vote. The man who didn't count it will be hauled up before a jury, he will plead not guilty, and the jury, upon deliberation, will find him not guilty. A federal judge, in a similar situation, might find the defendant guilty, a judgment which would affirm the law and conform with the relevant political abstractions, but whose consequences might be violent and anarchistic.

The central question that emerges--and it is not a parliamentary question or a question that is answered by meerely consulting a catalog of the rights of American citizens, born Equal--is whether the White community in the South is entitled to take such measures as are necessary to prevail, politically and culturally, in areas in which it does not predominate numerically? The sobering answer is Yes--the White community is so entitled because, for the time being, it is the advanced ace. It is not easy, and it is unpleasant, to adduce statistics evidencing the median cultural superiority of White over Negro: but it is fact that obtrudes, one that cannot be hidden by ever-so-busy egalitarians and anthropologists. The question, as far as the White community is concerned, is whether the claims of civilization supersede those of universal suffrage.

National Review believes that the South's premises are correct. If the majority wills what is socially atavistic, then to thwart the majority may be, though undemocratic, enlightened. It is more important for any community, anywhere in the world, to affirm and live by civilized standards, than to bow to the demands of the numerical majority. Sometimes it becomes impossible to assert the will of a minority, in which case it must give way, and the society will regress; sometimes the numerical minority cannot prevail except by violence: then it must determine whether the prevalence of its will is worth the terrible price of violence....

The South confronts one grave moral challenge. It must not exploit the fact of Negro backwardness to preserve the Negro as a servile class. It is tempting and convenient to block the progress of a minority whose services, as menials, are economically useful. Let the South never permit itself to do this. So long as it is merely asserting the right to impose superior mores for whatever period it takes to effect a genuine cultural equality between the races, and so long as it does so by humane and charitable means, the South is in step with civilization, as is the Congress that permits it to function.”

What a tradition!