I’ve been going zomg on my twitter feed today, but it bears mentioning here because it’s just so bizarre. The first bit I ran across was this crazy article, with video, of extreme conservatives such as Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin endorsing marijuana legalization.
While I was still picking up pieces of my brain and putting them back in my skull from that tidbit, I found another article regarding Arnold Schwarzenegger filing a legal brief for gay marriages to resume immediately in the state of California.
Right now I’m feeling like maybe I’m woefully ignorant on how conservatives (and the Tea Party) actually work. As far as I can tell, up to this point, the Tea Party has been against government intervening into private lives (unless it’s something they disagree with, like those heathen gay folks). But they’ve been known to align themselves with extremist right politics, which is completely against legalization. Am I reading this wrong? Or has the country truly shifted to the left and they’re just using talking points to gain a legitimate foothold?
Schwarzenegger’s response to Prop 8 being overturned just baffles me. He stayed out of it earlier, but maybe because he’s not running for re-election he can now say how he truly feels about the gay marriage issue. He’s always struck me as fiscally conservative, but not socially conservative. It’s kind of nice to see the rule of law overturning overwhelming bigotry.
But what does it all mean? Does it mean that the country is facing hard facts that extreme social conservatism demands too high a price? It seems like we’re making baby steps towards a country that realizes that the ideals of a few extremist nutjobs are less important than what the country needs to move forward and be the best it can be.
One can only hope.