Top Thursday stories

• Gay marriage amendment
  
  
  
  • The State Senate approved an anti-gay-marriage constitutional amendment by a vote of 38-12. The version passed includes the modification made in committee last week (see last item here), which could make it difficult to resolve differences with the House bill. Notable was the lack of speeches by supporters of the measure...
    
    
  • A CityPaper piece looks at whether gay Philadelphians will leave the area if the state becomes less welcoming. We don't have neighboring states that allow gay marriage, but my own neighbors moved to New Jersey for better Domestic Partner benefits and protections -- that's one set of taxpayers who won't be coming back.
  
  
• US Senate race
  
  
  
  • Rick Santorum is no longer willing to sit watching his poll numbers slide, and today announced the intention to blanket the airwaves with ads between now and Election Day, leveraging his fundraising advantage. (More along the same lines here.) He will presumably be working on upping his current low approval rating...