Biden ‘comfortable’ with same-sex marriage

Vice President Biden on Sunday appeared to go further than he has in the past in expressing support for same-sex marriage.

In an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Biden described himself as “absolutely comfortable” with gay couples having the same rights as heterosexual couples.

“Look. I am vice president of the United States of America,” Biden said. “The president sets the policy. I am absolutely comfortable with the fact that men marrying men, women marrying women and heterosexual men and women marrying are entitled to the same exact rights, all the civil rights, all the civil liberties. And quite frankly, I don’t see much of a distinction beyond that.”

Asked whether the Obama administration in a second term would come out in favor of same-sex marriage, Biden declined to say.

“I can’t speak to that. I don’t know the answer to that,” he said.

Gay rights groups welcomed Biden’s comments and said President Obama should follow suit.

“We are encouraged by Vice President Biden’s comments, who rightly articulated that loving and committed gay and lesbian couples should be treated equally,” Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, said in a statement. “Now is the time for President Obama to speak out for full marriage equality for same-sex couples.”

It was not immediately clear whether Biden was speaking off-the-cuff or whether his remarks might have been part of a move by the Obama administration to inch closer toward an embrace of same-sex marriage through a high-level surrogate.

The “Meet the Press” interview was taped Friday. Immediately after its airing Sunday morning, a Biden spokesman said that the vice president “was saying what the president has said previously — that committed and loving same-sex couples deserve the same rights and protections enjoyed by all Americans, and that we oppose any effort to roll back those rights.

“That’s why we stopped defending the constitutionality of Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act in legal challenges and support legislation to repeal it,” the aide said. “Beyond that, the vice president was expressing that he too is evolving on the issue, after meeting so many committed couples and families in this country.”

Obama senior adviser David Axelrod said via Twitter shortly after Biden spoke: “What VP said-that all married couples should have exactly the same legal rights-is precisely POTUS’s position.”

The White House in February instructed the Justice Department to no longer defend the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act, the 1996 law that bans federal recognition of same-sex marriage. The move has led to a political battle with the Republican-led House, which has moved to defend the law in court.

Biden has previously said that he believes same-sex marriage is “an inevitability,” although he has stopped short of endorsing it. Biden said in a December 2010 interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America” that he agrees with Obama that he is continually “evolving” on the issue.

As Election Day 2012 approaches, Obama has come under criticism from gay rights groups and others for not endorsing same-sex marriage.

The issue is a politically thorny one for Obama. If he were to come out in favor of same-sex marriage, he would risk losing the support of some independents and could be viewed as acting out of political opportunism. If he continues “evolving” on the issue, he risks leaving a key part of his base disenchanted ahead of the November election.

It’s an issue that could come to a head this summer when Democrats craft their party platform at the Democratic National Convention.

In speaking about his views on same-sex marriage Sunday, Biden said that “when things really begin to change is when the social culture changes.

“I think ‘Will and Grace’ probably did more to educate the American public than almost anything anybody’s ever done so far,” he told host David Gregory, referring to an NBC television series that featured a gay lawyer and his best friend, a heterosexual woman. “And I think people fear that which is different. Now they’re beginning to understand.”

He declined to say whether he plans to run for president in 2016.

“I don’t know whether I’m gonna run,” he said.

Vladi­mir Putin takes presidential oath for new term in Russia

MOSCOW — Vladimir V. Putin took the presidential oath of office for the third time Monday, swearing to uphold the Russian Constitution as his hand rested on a red-bound copy. Outside, the streets were mostly empty, except for knots of would-be demonstrators who were hustled off to police vans.

Inside the Grand Kremlin Palace, nearly 3,000 dignitaries listened as Putin said he intended to strengthen democracy and make political dialogue more inclusive. Outside, about 120 were arrested, accused by police of attempting to demonstrate without permission more than half a mile from the Kremlin ceremony.

That tension between official promises of democracy and restrictions on protest may come to define what is now a six-year presidential term for Putin. The Russians who began demonstrating in December in favor of honest elections fear that a weakened Putin will crack down rather than liberalize. Their misgivings were only reinforced Sunday, when a harsh police presence confronted a 20,000-strong legal, anti-Putin march. About 450 were arrested.

Monday’s ceremony began just before noon, when outgoing president Dmitry Medvedev’s heavily guarded motorcade arrived at the Kremlin. Putin arrived shortly afterward, borne by limousine from the Russian White House on broad deserted boulevards, along the Moscow River, past the crazy-quilt cupolas of St. Basil’s Cathedral onto Red Square and through the Kremlin’s Spassky Gate, opened for the occasion.

Greeted by bayonet-carrying guards who slowly turned their hands to watch as he passed, Putin walked on a long red carpet through the grand, gilded halls: first St. George Hall, then St. Alexander and finally St. Andrew, the throne room of the czars. Above the palace, the presidential flag fluttered in the breeze, the white, blue and red of the Russian Federation emblazoned with the czarist double-headed eagle.

Medvedev, looking wan, even diminished, spoke first. “We launched the modernization of our economy,” he said, “although not everything worked out entirely as planned.”

Medvedev, who became president in 2008 as the hand-picked successor after Putin reached his two-term limit, had been seen as offering the promise of liberalization. But he disappointed his supporters when he agreed in September to switch places with Putin, declining to run for president against his mentor. He is expected to be named prime minister Tuesday.

Putin looked impassive, occasionally even glum. “We have passed a long and difficult road together,” he said. “We now feel confident. We restored our dignity as a great nation.”

As the short ceremony concluded with stirring music, the skies outside were growing heavier and heavier. Putin walked out the way he had come, this time stopping to acknowledge his wife, Lyudmilla, who is rarely seen in public. She was standing with Boris Yeltsin’s widow, Naina, and Medvedev’s wife Svetlana. Putin kissed each woman on the cheek with equal decorum, and then spoke a few words to his wife.

Off camera, he was given the nuclear suitcase. Then, outside in Cathedral Square, Putin and Medvedev reviewed the presidential guard, who loudly saluted “Comrade President.”

On the streets, about a thousand demonstrators tried to gather but were dispersed by police. Some clashed with pro-Putin youth groups, and the police arrested some of each. Activists reported that police were arresting people simply for wearing the white ribbon associated with anti-Putin demonstrators.

Boris Nemtsov, a long-time democrat who was detained Sunday and then released, told a radio station that police stormed into the Jean Jacques restaurant frequented by the opposition, overturning tables and rounding up activists, who were sitting at tables talking.

A sign soon went up on the restaurant door: “Closed for technical reasons.”

At the Grand Kremlin Palace, the inauguration was followed by a lavish banquet with champagne and caviar for the guests, who included a few foreign dignitaries, Putin’s friend Silvio Berlusconi, the former Italian prime minister, among them. Also on hand were Mikhail Prokhorov, a billionaire and unsuccessful presidential candidate; Mikhail Gorbachev, the last president of the Soviet Union; and other Russian officials and cultural figures.