Bachmann is to join the presidential race today… which I find really confusing because I thought she had already announced that at the last presidential debate… which I found really confusing at the time as I thought, “If you weren’t running for president until this moment, what are you doing at the debate?” Which made me wonder how many of the other candidates at the debate weren’t actually running for president yet.

Why is who is officially running for president such an inscrutable thing where only the most inside baseball pundits seem to be able to understand. Me — like all the other rubes — assumed that if you’re at a presidential debate, you’re running for president, but no, it’s much more complicated than that… for no purposeful reason.

There is no reason to have all this pointless ceremony around running for president. It should be a simple binary thing: You’re either running for president or you’re not. There is no need for an “exploratory committee”, just say you’re running for president and if you later think it’s a bad idea then you announce you’re no longer running for president. And there should be no pre-announcements and official announcements; whenever someone makes it clear he is running for president, that’s his announcement. If he tries to have an official announcement later, the media should get together and ignore that, because no, you already announced; you don’t get to announce twice.

Really, this should be a simple thing; let’s stop pretending it isn’t.

The main argument for gay marriage is holding these two conflicting statements true at the same time:

1. Marriage is a very special thing, so more people should be allowed to join in it.

2. Marriage is not a special thing, so changing its meaning isn’t a problem.

You see, this argument is how people keep arguing that gays are being harmed by not being allowed marriage, while at the same time trashing the institution as already demeaned (by pointing out all the divorce, affairs, and quick Vegas weddings) to argue that changing its definition won’t harm it further. It’s a rather incoherent argument, which is why much of gay marriage proponents mainly rely on an emotional appeal (“What’s wrong with two people loving each other?” as if government recognition has anything to do with people loving each other).

You really just have a lot of people trying to get something without examining what it is they want and why it’s worth something (which you can certainly say of many heterosexual couples getting married, too). Is marriage just a legal contract binding two people? Well, can’t two (or more) adults draw up whatever legal agreements they want between each other and campaign for businesses and whatnot to recognize them? Or is it something more than just a legal contact?

Why is marriage in America between one man and one woman when there are other types of marriage in history (such as plural marriages)? It’s because of Christianity, and Jesus’s teaching (mainly Matthew 19) that Adam and Eve is God’s example of a marriage and that it involves just one man and one woman joined together. So really, marriage is a religious institution — specifically Christian — inscribed in law. It’s just such a fundamental one to society that for hundreds of years people never took much notice that there was no separation of church and state when it comes to the recognition of marriage.

Given that marriage is a religious institution that the government participates in, there are two — and only two — logical responses.

1. Recognize its special place as religious institution fundamental to society and thus preserve it — perhaps even adding an amendment to the Constitution.

2. Have it removed from government entirely because of the separation of church and state and simply allow the government to recognize legal contracts between two or more adults, allowing them to put whatever ceremony on it they want.

Any other response, such as trying to redefine marriage — have the government redefine a religious institution — is intellectually incoherent. A lot of the proponents for gay marriage like to think the acceptance of their position is inevitable, but it doesn’t matter how much acceptance they get, as at the end of the day they are still trying to add two plus two and get five. No good will come of that.