"Amendment 2" or "If You Care About Your Grandpappy"

OK, so I know this is going to end up on Facebook, which is OK with me, but it's also totally against my usual inclination to be annoyed by political crap on people's pages.

AAAAANYWAY, I'm bored, and I'm waiting for GA tickets, so I'm gonna write up a post about the second constitutional initiative on Florida's ballot.

While I have no clue (and I mean no clue) why people care if gays get married, that has nothing to do with this post. You can argue with me about that later. I just want everyone, before they get carried away with their emotional voting, to read the language of the proposed amendment. To save you some internet searching, I'll quote it in relevant part here:

"[N]o other legal union that is treated as marriage or the substantial equivalent thereof shall be valid or recognized."

There are two (2) reasons why you need to vote "no" on this amendment. (Well, there are more, but there are two that aren't subjective.)

1) THERE IS ALREADY A LAW IN FLORIDA THAT SAYS MARRIAGE IS EXCLUSIVELY BETWEEN A MAN AND A WOMAN.
This is just an amendment on principle. It's an EMOTIONAL move to establish something that is already in print. Does this remind anyone else of John Kerry and those dogs?

2) THIS BILL, WHILE TRYING TO PREVENT HOMOSEXUAL MARRIAGES, OVEREXTENDS ITSELF INTO THE LIVES OF THE ELDERLY.
That's right. That's my main contention. Most (young) people don't realize that senior citizens get stripped of some pension benefits if they get remarried. That's why most older Americans choose not to remarry. Instead, they live in what's considered a "domestic partnership," where they can qualify for joint health care benefits and whatnot.

So, while this initiative is proposing to "protect marriage," it's really hurting the freedoms of a class of people I KNOW we want to protect. It's not fair for government to basically require senior citizens not to get married, and then tell them that they can't enjoy a domestic partnership either. And we want domestic partnerships for them. Maybe that way, they'll stop transmitting VD to each other.