What are North Carolina Republicans thinking? I don’t mean creating the ballot measure that passed today, the one mandating that only married, heterosexual couples are recognized by the state. That I get.

Sure, gays already can’t get married in North Carolina, so the whole exercise is an unnecessary waste of time, and countless heterosexual unmarried couples will now lose a host of domestic violence protection and child custody rights. But screw them. That’s not where I get confused.

My question is: why the hell is it on the PRIMARY election ballot?

The whole point of these ballot measures is to scare unenthusiastic religious homophobes to the polls to vote Republican. They’re certainly not excited about Mitt Romney. High-ranking Republicans who actually endorse him aren’t even excited about him. So you have to give them a scare. Convince voters that their weak marriages can only be strengthened by preventing hypothetical gay marriage. Already illegal gay marriage, that could somehow happen in a futuristic dystopian science-fiction novel scenario.

And now that you’re at the voting booth, why not check the box for (sigh) Mitt Romney?

Winning North Carolina is the focal point of President Obama’s entire re-election strategy. He’s having his convention there. He’s been regularly holding speaking events there. It carries 15 electoral votes, and the race is a dead heat. Romney could actually win the state in November, if conservatives show up to the polls.

So the NC Republican plan is to motivate their base six months early?

We still have a series of gay marriage battles in less contentious states in November. Like Maryland. Maryland. Republicans are going to motivate Republicans to vote / strengthen their marriage in Maryland? Is there any chance that Maryland is going to go red in November? Even Dick Cheney is lobbying to protect marriage equality in the state.

All that the North Carolina GOP had to do was wait half a year, and then punish gays for… well, existing, I guess.

I’m not trying to give advice to Republicans, of course, and I really hate to see an anti-gay ballot measure passed. I’m just confused. I mean, I know that extreme members of the GOP are homophobic, ignorant, scared, and hateful.

I just didn’t know they were so short-sighted.