The Church is smart
 

Whether you think the church's position was right or wrong, you have to admit the church is damn smart. It's not going to throw resources at a lost cause. I admit my faith on that was wavering, but the church proved itself again.

Yeah, they were smart like Republicans were smart to re-elect George Bush. Be careful what you wish for. Assuming your premise is correct here, when else have they been "smart." Please enlighten me.

Brigham Young was smart enough to prohibit Mormons from mining their mountains and for bringing sugar beets and silk worms to the west. Mormons were smart enough to take care of that annoying Fancher-Baker party in 1857, and they were smart enough to pretend to get rid of polygamy in 1890.

LDS leaders were smart enough to oppose the repeal of Prohibition and the New Deal in the 1930s. LDS voters, however, in these two cases proved to be even smarter.

I'm genuinely curious about what SLC's long term view of this is. Maybe that is just not something they feel they can worry about. My suspicion is that the pro-gay marriage folks are just going to wait this out. 5 years, 10 years, 15 years, until a point comes when public sentiment is overwhelmingly in favor of the repeal of this amendment. Then it will be over in a land slide. This is a when, not an if in my opinion.

So what will happen in the mean time is the people will just go to other states to marry and you won't have it in California for however long it takes them to repeal it. I may be really wrong, and would like to be, but I believe that gay marriage is going to be very commonplace in the culture not too many years hence and that we are going to have it in all the blue states at a minimum.

Maybe, as some have suggested, this was more a benefit to the members of the church who got a chance to exercise their faith than it was anything else.

I had this conversation this morning, elsewhere. Note that eight years ago Prop 22 got 61% of the vote, while yesterday Prop 8 garnered only 52%. Stats show it's the elderly who are overwhelmingly against gay marriage. So give it a few years.

So sometime in the first half of the next decade, be prepared to be asked to pony up even more $$$, and then again year after year, state by state.

Everybody on this thread so far . . .
 

Is really establishing one thing: A profound "deficit of knowledge" on what went on in California regarding Prop 8. No empathy, no intellectual curiosity (except for Utah Dan), but a whole lot of bitterness and snide smart-alec comments. Impressive, in a way.

There will be a purging in the Calif. wards if a portion of Pro 8 members consider their fellow members in the same manner as some do on CB. How would you like all the other members in your ward thinking, "that guy hates the song I love to follow the Prophet".

Two historical analogies that come to mind--Little Big Horn and Pearl Harbor. Your coalition as well as the national election results have to tell you how ephemeral was this "victory." Seems even the thoughtful UtahDan agrees with this.

But please, enlighten me; tell me how I'm wrong.

Is Prop 8 a constitutional amendment? And if not, why create something the California Supreme Court is likely to overturn?

Yes, it amended the state constitution. But even that doesn't mean it won't be challenged in the courts. SF's city attorney will file papers very quickly challenging the initiative.