HOOF & MOUTH

First it was Rick Santorum, from my home state of Pennsylvania, & now former congressman & Senate candidate J.D. Hayworth from my adopted state of Arizona has also, you know, gone there—assured us that legitimizing same-sex marriage will lead inevitably to animal passion. Specifically, he asserted, in a Florida radio interview, that a Constitutional marriage amendment excluding same-sex hitching is—I'm quoting here—“the only way” to keep men from marrying horses.

In other words, just say neigh to same-sex marriage.

Hayworth asserts—inaccurately—that the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruling on the matter held that marriage was defined as “simply the establishment of intimacy” (it actually read “the voluntary union of two persons as spouses, to the exclusion of all others”), and that therefore “I guess that would mean if you really had affection for your horse, I guess you could marry your horse.” The Wife promptly noted that the ability of Hayworth’s spouse to establish intimacy with a horse’s backside is the only reason he was able to get married.

But I’m above such cheap shots.

I will ask, though—what is it about the concept of consent that conservative Republicans don’t get? Hayworth said that he was using the example to make “an absurd point,” but he doesn’t seem to grasp that the point isn’t absurd, it’s simply nonexistent. He & Santorum both leap from the idea of two consenting adults of the same sex choosing to marry each other to the idea of bestiality, as if a horse could legally give consent. But setting aside a difference that a seven-year-old could understand—that’s still too subtle for J.D.—the question remains: What is it with these guys & the quadrupeds?

Anyway, here’s Malcolm McDowell in bed with his horse in Caligula. Enjoy, J.D.