John McCain, on Jan. Ward is a former state senator who unsuccessfully challenged John McCain in the Republican Senate primary in McCain went on to win his sixth term. He died two years later of brain cancer.

Justices Thomas, Alito Blast Supreme Court Decision On Same-Sex Marriage Rights



Support for gay marriage reaches all-time high, survey finds
Obama himself was frustrated about it, if a description in a new book by his former top adviser, David Axelrod , is to be believed. Obama may have been selling himself short on that score, given the number of times he or his advisers publicly opposed same-sex marriage over the years. In the book, Believer: My Forty Years in Politics, Axelrod blames himself, and his political calculations, for preventing Obama for standing up for what he believed in. On issues from immigration to racially charged police violence to the decriminalization of marijuana , activists have voiced frustration at a perceived double-dealing by the president on the issues they hold most dear, and fatigue with repeated White House requests for patience. As a candidate for the Illinois state senate in , Obama said he favored same-sex marriage in response to a questionnaire from a Chicago-area gay and lesbian newspaper. But out on the presidential campaign trail in August , Obama gave voice to the opposite view in an interview with evangelical pastor Rick Warren, head of Saddleback megachurch in southern California. Now, for me as a Christian — for me — for me as a Christian, it is also a sacred union.


Chick-fil-A’s many controversies, explained
After France's first same-sex marriage, and a vote in the UK Parliament which puts England and Wales on course for gay weddings next summer, two US Supreme Court rulings expected soon could hasten the advance of same-sex marriage across the Atlantic. But some gay people remain opposed. Jonathan Soroff lives in liberal Massachusetts with his male partner, Sam. He doesn't fit the common stereotype of an opponent of gay marriage. Until the federal government recognises and codifies the same rights for same-sex couples as straight ones, equality is the goal so why get hung up on a word, he asks.




Seventy percent of Americans support same-sex marriage, according to the 11th annual American Values Survey , the highest percentage recorded by a major national poll. The results, released Monday, found just 28 percent of respondents oppose the right of gay couples to wed. Approval crossed the political divide, with majorities of Democrats 80 percent and independents 76 percent supporting same-sex marriage, and 50 percent of Republicans, according to the poll conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute PRRI in partnership with the Brookings Institution. Most major religious denominations back marriage equality, too, including white mainline Protestants 79 percent , Hispanic Roman Catholics 78 percent , religious non-Christians 72 percent Hispanic Protestants 68 percent , white Catholics 67 percent , Black Protestants 57 percent and other Christian denominations 56 percent. Religiously unaffiliated Americans were the most supportive, with 90 percent endorsing same-sex marriage.