What's the big deal about gay marriage?

My friend Mitch is really worried about Proposition 8 on the California ballot in two weeks.

Prop 8 is designed to reverse a decision by the California Supreme Court authoring marriage between two partners of the same sex. Mitch, who calls himself an "orthodox" Christian (he doesn't like the term fundamentalist), likes the idea of gay marriage only a little more than he likes gin and coke.

In fact, when the court announced its decision, he was very upset.

"This gay marriage thing is terrible." "Why?" "I've been married to my wife for nearly 30 years. I don't want to have to divorce her and marry a man."

Now you and I both know that sounds goofy, but it's no worse than some of the lies the Christian Right is spewing in its efforts to defeat Barack Obama and keep Republicans in power. One of the groups teetering on the edge of the lunatic fringe is Focus on the Family Action, the political arm of James Dobson's group.

This group has publicized "A Letter from 2012 in Obama's America," basically saying that if we elect the Democrats, every single bit of the far-left's dream agenda will be implented during his first term. In addition, Russia will run rampant, the U.S. will suffer several more 9/11-type attacks and Tel Aviv will be destroyed by an Iranian nuclear weapon.

I don't want to go into the letter any deeper -- click on the link and read it if you want -- but Dobson's people basically warn young evangelicals who are voting for Obama because they like his idealism that they could be destroying America in the process.

The one thing that is obvious to me in this is that with Jerry Falwell dead and Pat Robertson selling vitamins, Jimmy D is trying to step up and become Mr. Christian Right.

Just as Republicans have been doing for 30 years to mobilize their base, the letter is about 90 percent "God, guns and gays." The rest is national security. Of course Jimmy cares very little about the economy, or Wall Street, or the fact that his beloved GOP has presided over an ever-widening wealth gap.

The good news is that most folks aren't listening.

Polls released today show Obama ahead in states like Indiana and North Carolina, and dead even in North Dakota and Montana. McCain and Palin are sinking fast.

In fact, my friend Mitch isn't as goofy as I said. Once I told him that if was against gay marriage, he should just stay married to his wife, he breathed a sigh of relief.

The even more amazing news?

He's thinking of voting for Obama.