Group Behind "The Marriage Vow" Which Included Reference To Family Structure During Slavery Removes Reference From Pledge And Apologizes

Oops.

Rep. Michele Bachmann had been the first GOP hopeful to sign “The Marriage Vow,” which included in the introduction a section that lamented that “the Institution of Marriage in America is in great crisis.”

One piece of evidence it offered was the claim that a black person born into slavery “was more likely to be raised by his mother and father in a two-parent household than was an African-American baby born after the election of the USA’s first African-American president.”

...“After careful deliberation and wise insight and input from valued colleagues we deeply respect, we agree that the statement referencing children born into slavery can be misconstrued,” said Julie Summa, a spokeswoman for the Family Leader. “We sincerely apologize for any negative feelings this has caused, and have removed the language from the vow.”

The primary goal of the document was to affirm “that ALL of us must work to strengthen and support families and marriages between one woman and one man,” the statement said.

Ah, the sorry if we offended you apology. How about an apology for writing something so deeply stupid? Meh, that's the standard today I guess. In a better world when people screw up, they should just admit they screwed up. We do not however live in a better world, we live in this one.

Now that we've disposed with a group no one ever heard of before...what the hell were Bachmann and Rick Santorum thinking in signing this thing? Seriously, if you're argument even in part relies on a positive comparison with life during slavery in America, you really, really need to take a minute and reevaluate your position.

Clearly there's a strong and politically compelling argument that liberal policies have done great damage not to just the black family but American families in general. There are plenty of ways to make that case effectively without this kind of strange and ultimately self-defeating talking point.

I guess it's good that this group (again, who the hell are they?) listened to "wise insight and input from valued colleagues" but why weren't two candidates for the GOP nomination among those people saying to the group...'Really? That's a comparison you want to make?" Shouldn't candidates for the highest office offer "wise insight" to their political supporters when they go awry?

According to the article, it's the Bachmann camp distributing the statement retracting the slavery comparison. Clearly they want to distance themselves from that part of the pledge but that's meaningless. She and Santorum signed when that was part of it, they own the fact they didn't object or object enough to take a pass.

Whatever credit Family Leader gets for exercising good judgement for retracting that part of their pledge doesn't redound to either candidate. Their judgement on this issue is still very much in question.

Added: Every post could include a screed about media bias and this one is no different. The reason I even posted it is because it generate some discussion last night in a budget thread. It seemed fair to note that the contentious statement had been retracted.

The bias angle is, this will get played up by the MFM to hurt Bachmann. As you can see, I think it's a fair hit on her judgement. That said, the MFM never promotes controversial pledges by a liberal like Obama. Remember this video where he basically promised to disarm the US?

It got big play in conservative circles but I don't remember a peep in the MFM.

It's like they pick sides or something.

posted by DrewM. at 11:48 AM

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