How did gay-marriage advocates persuade New Hampshire Dems in the state senate to narrowly support gay marriage? They got the national Democratic party to threaten state senators with retaliation if they didn’t toe the line, such as primary opponents, or even moving the presidential primary date out of NH. That’s how.

This is political hardball: my way or we’ll hurt you (politically) if we can. If the donor base for gay-marriage is powerful enough to get the Dems to do this to their own, you have to ask yourself: What are they going to do with the power of the law once they get it to the GOP’s base of religious voters? Is this really about that nice couple down the street and their benefits?