From: Ouko joachim omolo
Colleagues Home & Abroad Regional News

BY FR JOACHIM OMOLO OUKO, AJ
NAIROBI-KENYA
FRIDAY, MAY 11, 2012

Politically correct, when President Barack Obama said Wednesday he supported gay marriage, reversing his position on a controversial social issue just six months before the November election, he had widely consulted his advisors.

His advisors know that public support for same-sex marriage has grown in America since the 1990s and by endorsing same sex marriage will not bar him from re-election. In 1996, just 25 percent of Americans supported legalization. Today this figure has rapidly gone up. Public support for same-sex marriage continued to grow in 2011.

On whether Republicans which support the views of Catholics will use this trend to campaign against Obama, overall, the survey found 53 percent of Catholics supported the idea of same-sex marriage.

Further more, among Democrats, 62 percent are in favor of gay marriage while 74 percent of Republicans are opposed with 52 percent of Independents in favor. Obama counts on the strong pattern of liberalism among Catholics that stands in opposition to the church hierarchy.

Catholics make up their own minds about these moral issues irrespective – or almost in spite of – what the bishops and official church teachings say.

On Wednesday, Obama explained, “I had hesitated on gay marriage, in part because I thought civil unions would be sufficient… And I was sensitive to the fact that for a lot of people the word ‘marriage’ was something that invokes very powerful traditions, religious beliefs and so forth.”

He said his position was influenced by gay members of the military and his staff who are raising children together in monogamous relationships. President Obama is targeting military due to his new initiatives to help support military families across the country that he said is not just a moral obligation, but a matter of national security.

The initiatives focus on putting a new emphasis on the quality of life for military families, the education and development of military children, redoubling efforts to help military spouses pursue their educations and careers, and increasing child care for our military moms and dads with young children.

According to a March Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll in 2009, only 40 percent of Americans oppose gay marriage. In a recent Gallup survey, 50 percent approved of gay marriage, while 48 percent said they opposed it. But polls consistently show rising support in recent years.

In another survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, released recently, majority of U.S. Catholics now say they support same-sex marriage. The survey found 52 percent of Catholics are in favor of same-sex marriage and 37 percent against.

In 2010, Catholics were more evenly divided on the issue, with 46 percent favoring it and 42 percent opposing it. The Pew survey also found white mainline Protestants are the most supportive of same-sex marriage of any religious group, at 54 percent.

White evangelical Protestants express the greatest opposition, with 74 percent saying they oppose it. The views of these groups have not changed since 2010. That is why Obama is so confident that despite his support to same sex marriage he will still win.

Compared with evangelicals and black Protestants, white mainline Protestants are more supportive of same-sex marriage, with 54 percent saying they favor allowing gay and lesbian couples to get married.

Among Catholics as a whole, supporters of same-sex marriage now outnumber opponents (52 vs. 37 percent), including majority of Catholics who believe that employers should be required to provide health care plans that cover contraception and birth control at no cost, despite the objection of their bishops.

Nearly half of Americans (49 percent) say that religiously affiliated colleges and hospitals should be required to provide employees with free contraception coverage. Nearly as many (46 percent) say they should not.

A majority of Catholics (58 percent) support the contraception mandate generally. While Catholic Church teaching proscribes the use of artificial birth control to avoid conception, 98 percent of Catholics use contraception, according to separate surveys.

Young people and the religiously unaffiliated are much more likely to believe all institutions, religious or not, should provide free contraception coverage to their employees. Less than a third (31 percent) of white evangelicals agree.

The survey of 1,009 adults was conducted Feb. 1-5 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percent. The sample included 219 Catholics and 168 Catholic voters. The margins of error for this sample are plus or minus 6.5 and 7.5 percentage points, respectively.

Obama essentially is betting that his decision will generate enough enthusiasm among young people to offset any votes he will lose from moderate and conservative whites who disagree with him. Seventy one percent of voters- ages 18-29 is crucial group for Obama- they favored legalization of gay marriage in three Gallup polls taken over the past year.

A key part of Obama’s calculus, analysts said, also will be to hold on to the enormous majority he enjoys among black voters. Church-going blacks are divided over gay marriage but pollsters say they are unlikely to vote for Republican Mitt Romney over Obama, the nation’s first black president, in November.

Poll experts argue that from this strategic vantage point, Obama is making a good decision here because this is the direction the country is going.

Reuters/Ipsos online polling data from 2012 indicates that more than half of registered voters under age 35 think same-sex marriage should be allowed, while just 22 percent of that age group think it should be illegal.

The question was asked of 7,616 registered voters under age 35 between January 1 and May 3, and the results have an accuracy of plus or minus 1.3 percentage points.

About 90 percent of blacks who favor gay marriage would also vote for Obama, according to Reuters/Ipsos polling after Romney became the clear Republican nominee, between early April and May 3.

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