Biden on same-sex marriage: "I am absolutely comfortable"
Bill Adams, AP Photo/The Express-Times
(CBS News) Vice President Joe Biden went where President Barack Obama hasn't yet gone: In support of same-sex marriage, saying he's "absolutely comfortable" with it.
"I am absolutely comfortable with the fact that men marrying men, women marrying women, and heterosexual men and women marrying another are entitled to the same exact rights, all the civil rights, all the civil liberties," Biden said Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press."
When asked if the president would push for legalizing same-sex marriage in a second term, Biden said, "I can't speak to that.... I don't know the answer to that," noting that the president sets policy.
A spokesperson for the vice president said his position is "evolving on the issue" and was reaffirming what the president "has said previously - that committed and loving same-sex couples deserve the same rights and protections enjoyed by all Americans."
But the president, who supports civil unions, has hedged on marriage. In 2010, President Obama said his view is "evolving" and that he "struggles" with the issue.
Biden has spoken openly about same-sex marriage before, previously calling it inevitable.
"The country's evolving and there's inevitability for national consensus on gay marriage," he said on ABC's "Good Morning America" in December, 2010.
On Sunday, Biden credited pop-culture with moving the country on the issue.
"I take a look at when things really begin to change, is when the social culture changes. I think 'Will and Grace' probably did more to educate the American public than almost anything anybody's ever done so far. And I think, people fear that which is different. Now they're beginning to understand," Biden said.
Six states and the District of Columbia allow same-sex marriages. A recent Maryland law allowing it has yet to go into effect.
On Tuesday, however, North Carolina voters will vote on a state constitutional amendment defining marriage between a man and a woman.
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Other VP's have expressed this same opinion in the not so distant past, namely Cheney and never was such an uproar made. Or was his personal opinion somehow linked to policy or the sitting President.
This type of junk has gotten so predictably old, a very sad ill willed comedy playing across America.
The media and politicians don't seem to be quite up to speed with the fact the vast majority of America is sick of the soap opera melodrama being played out by politicians, in the name of politicians and by the media all clamoring for those dollars they get paid to promote the latest greatest absurdity to slime each other.
Its boring. Its stupid. Its much like these folks got stuck in the 5 year old playground and never figured out how to grow up enough to find their way.
A new approach needs to be found. One that doesn't insult Americans like we're all mindless uneducated morons. Then again, those at the top would have to believe we're not exactly those things.. which doesn't seem to be the case.