Help me decide if I should help this local politician with her campaign (SSM issue)

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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I met a woman this morning at the Optimist Club meeting who is running for the State Legislature. She is running as a republican and we had a long issues-based discussion.

She seems honest and down-to-earth. She was open about her views, didn’t stay on the fence or try to placate me during the discussion, and came across as someone who was involved in politics because she wants to make a difference. I appreciate that in someone running for political office. I liked her and I was impressed.

I consider myself to be pretty much a libertarian. I think government should be as small and efficient as possible (republican-type when it comes to money issues) but should also stay out of our bedrooms/lives/bodies (democrat-type when it comes to personal issues).

Her views are in-line with mine when it comes to taxes and money issues. They are similar to mine when it comes to abortion - government should just stay out of it - its a woman’s personal choice and no one else’s.

My problem is our differing views on same-sex marriage. She said she tries to take the emotion out of how she views it and look at it from a financial perspective. It would cost taxpayers money to allow benefits to SS couples in the form of social security and offering work benefits to SS spouse.

If I choose to volunteer my time to her campaign, I’ll not expect to be able to change her view of the situation. Abortion/women’s rights and SSM/gay issues are the two biggies I tend to look at when voting for a candidate. Also, I know that if I choose not to work with her, I probably won’t be working for her opponent, either.

So tell me, how would you weigh these issues in your mind? If you find a candidate that seems honest and that you feel you can get behind, but you disagree about one of your major issues, would you step back or jump in?

I’m not necessarily looking for arguments to sway her to my side. I’m trying to decide if I can/should accept that we disagree on this but she’s still someone I can get behind and feel good about spending time trying to help her get elected.

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Oops. I think I should have put this in IMHO. Sorry, mods.

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Why don’t you ask her for stats to back up her assertion? What figures does she have? What would the projected costs be?

When I was doing some research on this issue several years ago (off-line - pre-internet), the stats I saw uniformly indicated that employers who expanded their benefits and pension plans to include gay and lesbian couples reported that the cost was in the range of 0.5% to 1.5% of the total cost of the plan. This was in marked contrast to expanding plans to include opposite-sex common law couples - including those groups in the plan cost in the range of 15% to 20%. Two reasons cited for the difference was that the absolute numbers of same-sex couples is very low, compared to opposite-sex couples, and that opposite-sex couples tended to have children more than same-sex couples, so the associated costs were higher.

So, ask her for proof of the assertion. Where’s the data? and if her data resembles the above, ask her if a 1% increase in costs is an appropriate reason to deny equal treatment.

And if she doesn’t provide data to back up her assertion, well, then you know she’s just talking bull-puckey to hide her real reasons for her position.