Fisk this

Unhappy with President Bush’s treatment of the marriage issue in last night’s State of the Union address, Andrew Sullivan decides to fisk the relevant passages. Now, fisking excerpts from a SOTU is a bit like fisking a bumper sticker, and indeed Sullivan’s fisking consists mostly of demanding specifics, something these speeches almost never provide on any issue. As I see it, though, Bush’s core point is sound — the electorate should decide the issue of gay marriage, not judges. The union of two men (or two women) is not the same thing as the union of a man and a woman. There are arguments in favor of nonetheless treating gay unions as marriages, but this unprecedented move should not be imposed on society by judges. President Bush therefore got it exactly right when he said, “On an issue of such great consequence, the people’s voice must be heard.”