If You REALLY Want to Pouf-Proof Marriage. . .

As a dutiful Arizonan much concerned to preserve matrimony in its present thoroughly unsullied, post-Britney-Haggard-McCain-Craig state, I must advise Cathi (love that "i," don't you?) Herrod and the Center for Arizona Policy of a fatal weakness in her strategy to limit marrying to one man and one woman.

Someone should bring this immediately to Mrs. Herrod's attention even if she can't read. Tell it to her. Slowly.

The thing is, the plan to reserve marriage to "one man and one woman" actually won't keep gay men and lesbians out of marriage. It can't.

Sometimes gay men and lesbians enter into matrimony in the usual way: by wedding a member of the opposite sex. Worse, they're driven to it by social disapproval--exactly the same thing that's behind Cathi's proposed amendment, right?

So here's my worry. What if heaping still more abuse onto homosexuals isn't going to keep us out of the closet after all? What if it has just the opposite effect?

More and more of us will want to hide, right? And what better way to hide than getting married? You see the concern.

Cathi Herrod's strategy will mean that even more of us will get married to forestall the dreadful possibility that someday we will want to get married.

It's too horrible to contemplate.

I can see only one solution.

If Mrs. Herrod really wants to reserve marriage for heterosexuals, she's going to have to call for a constitutional test--er, I mean a test in the constitution--for bona fide heterosexuality, and any man or woman who wants to get married in this state will first have to pass it.

I'm sure that Mrs. Herrod can devise a fool-proof--well, maybe not "fool"-proof exactly, more "pouf-proof"--method to prove heterosexuality.

Actually, I think they have a test like that already. It's for sex offenders. (Oh my.)

No need to reinvent the wheel, Cathi. Just come up with something for the girls and we're good to go. Pass the test and get married with heterosexual bells ringing.

I can't imagine anyone would balk at that. There's certainly no reason for worry. . .