We need to have a little perspective, folks. This smells like a victory, and from my layman's perspective, probably a sound way to go about getting to full equality. Marriage is both a legal and cultural construct. The court said yesterday that the state has no business telling any adult couple in New Jersey that they could not have the full and complete slate of rights and responsibilities given to what has for a very long time been marriage. Read Adam Bonin for the details on what was gained.

That's huge to me. That's huge for me. They also said that the cultural side of the question -- whether to call such unions "marriage" -- is properly decided by the legislature in Trenton. Maybe it's because I have a reverence for legislature, dunno, but the people's representatives do have their place in making these decisions at the pace right for the state. We want a lasting, enduring standing on marriage equality, so that we're not still arguing it 50 and 100 years from now.

I remember the dark old days where just support for equal rights for committed adult couples made a Democratic presidential candidate a raving leftist. That was way back in 2003. Today we've got civil unions in Vermont, marriage in Massachusetts, now this in New Jersey, so on and so forth. The arc of history is bending toward justice, and quickly.