If Vito Spatafore Had Only Waited a Few Months…

New Hampshire is about to join the New England gay union bloc:

New Hampshire lawmakers voted Thursday to authorize civil unions and sent the measure to Gov. John Lynch, who announced last week that he would sign it.

… the success of civil unions was an about-face from two years earlier, when a study panel recommended New Hampshire give no meaningful consideration to extending legal recognition to gay couples.

That panel had concluded that homosexuality was a choice, and it endorsed a constitutional amendment to limit marriage to unions between a man and a woman. State lawmakers have defeated proposed constitutional bans on same-sex marriage two years in a row.

Thursday's legislation, passed 14-10 along party lines in the Senate—Democrats in favor, Republicans opposed—will allow civil unions in New Hampshire starting Jan. 1.

That's the backstory—Democrats opened a ACME novelty-sized brand of whup-ass on the New Hampshire GOP last year. The state Republicans haven't budged on the issue, but they've become irrelevant.