Andrew Sullivan
Can't say I usually dig what Andy has to say, but this is one instance where we're in full agreement.

WAR IS DECLARED: The president launched a war today against the civil rights of gay citizens and their families. And just as importantly, he launched a war to defile the most sacred document in the land. Rather than allow the contentious and difficult issue of equal marriage rights to be fought over in the states, rather than let politics and the law take their course, rather than keep the Constitution out of the culture wars, this president wants to drag the very founding document into his re-election campaign. He is proposing to remove civil rights from one group of American citizens - and do so in the Constitution itself. The message could not be plainer: these citizens do not fully belong in America. Their relationships must be stigmatized in the very Constitution itself. The document that should be uniting the country will now be used to divide it, to single out a group of people for discrimination itself, and to do so for narrow electoral purposes. Not since the horrifying legacy of Constitutional racial discrimination in this country has such a goal been even thought of, let alone pursued. Those of us who supported this president in 2000, who have backed him whole-heartedly during the war, who have endured scorn from our peers as a result, who trusted that this president was indeed a uniter rather than a divider, now know the truth.

It is important to note that the specific bill to which Bush had shown favor denies both marriage and civil unions to gays. See Professor Balkin on this. However, Bush's statement made today says this:

The amendment should fully protect marriage, while leaving the state legislatures free to make their own choices in defining legal arrangements other than marriage.

Profesor Balkin assumes this is a concession and a backing off of the Federal Marriage Amendment that has been debated in the Senate for a few weeks. Balkin writes:

My friend Mark Tushnet who teaches at Georgetown University, remarked to me the other day that what is most remarkable about the debate over same sex marriage is that within a few year's time the moderate conservative position has now shifted from opposing all recognition of same sex partnerships to conceding that states may pass civil unions, as long as these are not called marriages.

Still, we know that Bush words don't always equal Bush deeds. We have to wait and see which specific amendment Bush backs. If it's the FMA, he does not, indeed, suport the State's ability to define other arrangements, ie- civil unions.
I wonder if, in the above except, Bush isn't refering to the civil contractual arrangements that gay couples might make to secure certain similarities to a marriage situation. If so, this is not civil unions...it is a loosely held together duct-tape like immitation thereof. It would be like a two-year-old's drawing of the Mona Lisa.

UPDATE
Old news...but everytime I read this line I have to wonder:

Quick action is essential, he said, to bring clarity to the law and protect husband-and-wife marriages from a few "activist judges."

How in the hell are judges doing a thing to harm my mom and dad's marriage? Is the judge urging infidelity? Whispering promises of a new life to one parent?

BS, when so pure and stinky, is truly spectacular.