Frist Supports States' Rights
... except when states don't hate the same people he does

Never trust a conservative talking about "states rights." People who still wish the Confederacy won the Civil War will go to great lengths to persuade you that they're not racist--they just believe in states' rights (man, those Northerners were just so MEAN to the Southerners, forcing them to give up slavery!) It was the late Strom Thurmond's favorite excuse--once his open bigotry went out of style, he began to insist that his vigorous campaigns against integration weren't about racism, but about... states' rights.

Which brings us to all the conservatives currently arguing that the Supreme Court has no right to infringe on the rights of states to "express the morals" of their residents. (Translation: the Supreme Court has no right to infringe on the rights of states to treat gay/lesbian/bisexual/trans people like shit.)

... conservatives like Bill Frist. The Senate Majority Leader says he thinks the Supreme Court's decision to overturn sodomy laws was misguided because such laws should be left up to the states. From the AP:

"Generally, I think matters such as sodomy should be addressed by the state legislatures," Frist said. "That's where those decisions -- with the local norms, the local mores -- are being able to have their input in reflected."

But what if those local norms and mores are San Francisco or Manhattan mores? What if local norms and mores in a state support something like, say, same-sex marriage? Suddenly, big government is Bill's best friend: time to amend the federal Constitution!

Asked whether he supported an amendment that would ban any marriage in the United States except a union of a man and a woman, Frist said: "I absolutely do, of course I do."

In other words: social conservatives support states rights only for socially conservative states.

P.P.S. Reader Philip P. chides me for "ignoring completely Frist's argument that allowing legal acts to actually be legal would lead to illegal acts being committed" but then relents since August already covered that. He also directs your attention to a really icky conservative cartoon about the sodomy ruling that I actually saw earlier this morning but didn't get a chance to blog about.