Rep. Eugene O'Flaherty (Chelsea) is going over to the dark side. He's just too tired to continue the battle to preserve traditional marriage. The "gays" have succeeded in wearing him down.
What's with these men in our Mass. Legislature? Are they all getting female hormone injections? Where are the real men?
O'Flaherty just had a lovely vacation in Europe. But he's still too exhausted to deal with the biggest issue facing our society since abortion and Muslim terrorist attacks. In his position as House Chair of the Judiciary Committee, this has some significance.
Could it be that the gays smelled blood in the water after O'Flaherty's recent drunk driving bill fiasco, and tempted him with their $upport in exchange for this change of heart? Will the recently announced homosexual challenger for his seat back out of the race now?
Bay Windows is happy:
State Rep. Eugene O'Flaherty, an influential opponent of civil marriage rights for same-sex couples, now says that he is opposed to the current effort to put a gay marriage ban on the 2008 ballot. During a lengthy interview with Bay Windows, O'Flaherty also says that as House chair of the legislature's Joint Committee on the Judiciary he will recommend that the legislation not be passed should it come before his committee, as it likely will....
As one longtime State House observer says of O'Flaherty, "He hasn't [just] opposed the gay community, he has led the fight against the gay community viciously and vociferously."
But a number of factors have convinced the five-term legislator to change his position. The lengthy debate on marriage, O'Flaherty says, has consumed too much of his time as a legislator. "I want to try to dispose of this issue," he says. "It's occupied the last three years of my life; a lot of time, a lot of energy and I'd like to apply that to healthcare. I'd like to apply that to some of the other issues that we have in front of us, that as far as I'm concerned, are much more important to our constituents at this point."
He also says he's been influenced by his constituents, most notably Charlestown political activist Ken Stone, a gay man whose wedding O'Flaherty attended last year.
