An open letter to President Bush

Dear Mr. President,

Stop. Please, just stop. Pour yourself a nice cool glass of lemonade, sit down, and listen.

I'd like to call your attention to the Constitution. Certainly you must be familiar with this, as you're the head of the government that it established, but I think we ought to review it. An American can never spend too much time with the Constitution, in my opinion. I believe it's on display in the National Archives, not far from where you live, but if getting there is a hassle for you, you can check it out online. Here's a copy for you.

The structure of it is fairly self-explanatory and also fairly comprehensive. The first part sets out the rules for the legislature, the second for the executive, and the third for the judiciary. There's a bit about the various states and the union of them and whatnot, and then there are some amendments. The first ten are, as I'm sure you're aware, commonly referred to as the Bill of Rights, and are held to be extremely important. They essentially lay the rules out for the government, saying that there are some areas of citizens' lives where it's hands-off for the government. It's interesting, at least to me, because it's one of those historical documents that outlines not the power of the government over the citizens, but the power of the citizens over the government. The government cannot prohibit you from protesting. They can't start or fund a church. They can't arrest you without cause or search your property without reason. Personally I'm quite fond of these things, and think that if you're looking for a definition of the American spirit, there it is: The government answers to the people, not the other way around.

Now, let's look at the amendments in general. There's a wide range of topics covered: judicial proceedings, freedom of the press, elections, and so on. Twenty-seven amendments in total. Many of them, as I mentioned, serve to guard the rights of citizens. One of them, however, served to limit peoples' rights. This was the 18th amendment, which banned the "manufacture, sale, or transportation" of alcohol within the United States.

As you're well aware, there are certainly dry towns and counties in America but it's strictly a local decision. This is because of the 21st amendment, which exists solely to repeal the 18th amendment. That's how strong the Constitution is, you see: In order to undo something said in it, you need to again alter it.

Now, let's talk about what you're up to. You've been busy lately, with Afghanistan and Iraq and Iran and North Korea and what not. But, as an ambitious man, you don't rest. Now you again want to amend the constitution to ban gay marriage.

First of all: Precedent is working against you here. The only time the constitution was used to tell citizens "Nope, you can't do that because we think it's morally wrong," it didn't work out to well.

Second: You don't have to like the idea of same-gender marriage. You don't have to like anything but plain-vanilla, mom-pop-and-2.5-kids Americana. For all I care, you can utterly and totally despise anyone who's not strictly heterosexual. I hope you don't, because hatred isn't a very productive emotion, but if you want to feel it, that's yours to feel. You do, however, need to respect that someone who happens to be gay has in no way broken a law and therefore, limiting their rights is a disgraceful and entirely unacceptable action. You don't like gay marriage? Great. Don't marry a man.

Third: This isn't the first time this issue has come up, Mr. President. You and your supporters are constantly saying that it's an issue of family values. You've said that "the commitment of a husband and a wife to love and serve one another promotes the welfare of children and the stability of society." I can't argue against that and honestly, if you were simply saying that away from the context of same-sex marriage I'd likely agree with you. Families are good. I was lucky and grew up in a stable, loving family, and I'm thankful for that.

But what I don't understand is this: Why can't the commitment of two men to love and serve one another promote the welfare of children and the stability of society? Or the commitment between two women? Certainly I can't cite any statistics at you, since gay marriage hasn't historically been legal here. But if there are two parents, and they're loving and committed to their family, what's the problem? There are thousands of children in the US who are waiting to be adopted into such situations, someplace stable, with parents. A child's going to have role models of both gender no matter what their home life is like. There'll be teachers and coaches and scout leaders and neighbors for them. There'll be friends of the family. To me, the argument that it's not stable, and not good for children, seems so very flawed.

What's left? Your personal religious views? That's fine, you're completely entitled to them. I happen to disagree, but I won't tell you you're wrong. I will say that I don't care. I will say that even if a majority of Americans agree with you on that topic, even if ninety percent of Americans agree with you, I don't care. Historically most Americans supported slavery and segregation. Most Americans are Christian and therefore think my family's religious views are wrong: should Judaism be banned? Most Americans are monotheistic: should Hinduism be outlawed? Absolutely not, and all but the most extreme would agree with me. It would be absurd to even propose such a thing. So why the difference? Religious beliefs aren't a choice and nothing can be proven correct or incorrect, and the same goes for sexuality.

I won't say that you've made the world a worse place in your years in office. I won't say that you're a terrible leader. For all I know history may hail you as a great leader, a hundred years down the line. But for now, all I can say is this: stop. Stop trying to use the Constitution against Americans. Stop wasting your time on these idiotic political pandering. Focus on something important: focus on nuclear proliferation, or poverty, or AIDS, or anything like that. Focus on the real issues that do effect the welfare of children and the stability of society.

With all due sincerity and respect,

A very pissed-off American.