The battle in the Democratic Party over the sanctity of its platform in favor of gay unions became more convoluted with Councilman Gary Okino's announcement that he'll likely challenge 'Aiea Rep. Blake Oshiro in the Democratic primary.

Oshiro, the House majority leader, was the sponsor of HB 444 allowing for civil unions while Okino was one of its most vocal critics — and he's made little secret that the issue is his primary motivation for running against Oshiro.

Last month, the state Democratic Party reprimanded state Sen. Mike Gabbard for helping to lead the successful effort to at least temporarily derail HB 444 in the Senate.

His punishment by the party's state central committee occurred after top Democratic elected officials had encouraged Gabbard to jump from the GOP to the Democrats in full knowledge that he'd led the fight against gay unions for more than a decade and had no intention of getting in line with the party platform.

The party took no action against other Democratic senators who opposed HB 444 or other prominent Democrats like Okino who actively worked against it.

Gabbard was singled out because he warned that support for civil unions could cause lawmakers to lose their jobs, but Okino warned legislators of a penalty more severe than losing their jobs — incurring the wrath of God.

In testimony before the Legislature more extreme than anything Gabbard said this year, Okino said civil unions were against the word of God, described homosexual relationships  as a perversion and accused gay people of spreading disease.

In response to a senator's question, Okino, who is active in the Transformation Hawai'i movement to bring God into government, said he bases his moral decisions on the Bible rather than the law.

Okino said he's running against Oshiro "to kind of bring a righteous point of view" and won't support the party's platform on gay unions or other social issues.

"It is the people's party, right?" he said.

People who seem seriously conflicted on the platform. anyway.

It figured that the scrap between Sen. Mike Gabbard and the Democratic Party over gay unions would have a bizarre ending.

The state central committee voted 37 to 31 Saturday to support the O'ahu Democratic Party's reprimand of Gabbard for encouraging senators to oppose HB 444 allowing civil unions — but only after Gabbard snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

Insiders say Gabbard, who initiated the appeal, had the votes to overturn the reprimand by a comfortable margin, but angered committee members by making a relatively brief statement and refusing to stay to answer questions.

A number of members reversed their initial inclination to let Gabbard off the hook, resulting in the narrow vote to slap him down for acting in opposition to the Democratic platform on civil unions.

Why file the appeal if he didn't intend to fully participate in the proceedings? If he wanted to tell the party to take a flying leap, why not just ignore the O'ahu reprimand instead of going out of his way to thumb his nose at the state committee that started out mostly on his side?

The outcome only deepened the hole of hypocrisy Democrats have dug themselves into over Gabbard.

Gabbard's switch from the GOP to the Democrats was encouraged by some of the party's highest elected officials, including U.S. Sen. Daniel Akaka and state Senate President Colleen Hanabusa, who rewarded Gabbard for coming over with the chairmanship of the Energy and Environment Committee.

Gabbard made clear that he wouldn't change his opposition to gay unions and abortion, positions that run contrary to the Democratic platform on issues dearest to some of the most active members of the party.

While the activists' dismay is understandable, it's absurd to reprimand him now for doing exactly what he said he'd do when he was welcomed with open arms by the party's top dogs.

Excuses are thin for singling out Gabbard from other Democrats who helped stall HB 444 by voting against it, speaking against it or working behind the scenes to prevent a vote.

Does the central committee vote mean that people who actively oppose HB 444 are no longer welcome in the Democratic Party?

As for Gabbard, reprimand is the least of the punishments a Democrat can receive for opposing the platform. When he continues to work against civil unions, will the party move on to his censure and expulsion?  Will the Democrats run "approved" candidates against Gabbard and others who oppose civil unions? Will they pressure the Senate to strip him of his committee chairmanship?

The community voted 2 to 1 against same-sex marriage in 1998 and is still deeply divided on civil unions.

By continuing to single out Gabbard for attention, Democrats only enhance his stature among like-minded voters, improve his  chances of getting opponents of gay unions active in party politics and increase his visibility for future runs for higher office.

I hope Hawai'i Republicans succeed in getting their act together at their state convention next month in Kona so we can return to some semblance of a two-party system.

Despite holding the governorship for six years, the fractured GOP is a bit player in local politics at this point and offers no credible opposition to the focused and well-organized Democrats.

That's not healthy for accountability in our state government.

Republicans held 19 of the 51 House seats before Gov. Linda Lingle was elected in 2002 and had five of the 25 Senate seats three years ago.

But Lingle, who won two terms by playing footsie with moderate Democrats, has been a non-factor in bringing other Republicans into power with her, and after the last election the GOP was down to six seats in the House and two in the Senate.

The party didn't even field candidates for 22 House seats and six of the 12 Senate seats up for election in 2008 — including the Kona Senate heat held by the retiring Republican Paul Whalen — making it difficult to count the GOP as a major political party in Hawai'i anymore.

Democratic chairman Brian Schatz accused his Republican counterpart Willes Lee of "political malpractice."

At this point, the GOP needs fresh leaders with fresh solutions for addressing Hawai'i's problems that break from the stale ideology that has run the party into the ground.

Without a dramatic move in a new direction and some gut issues that resonate with local voters, Hawai'i Republicans have little chance of significantly increasing their membership or recruiting quality legislative candidates to stand with them in 2010.

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I'll earn the ire of bird lovers with my column in the Opinion section of today's Advertiser, "Money for crows? What about people?"

Before the 2006 election, Democrats in the Legislature tried to take the air out of Republican Gov. Linda Lingle's re-election campaign by limiting out-of-state political donations to 20 percent of the total raised by a candidate.

It didn't work; Lingle still raised more than $6 million and swamped her Democratic opponent Randall Iwase.

Now that Lingle can't run again because of term limits and Democrats think they have a good chance to regain Hawai'i's top office in 2010, the House Judiciary Committee has moved a bill to repeal the limit on out-of-state donations.

It especially benefits U.S. Rep. Neil Abercrombie, one of the leading Democratic contenders, whose chances are heavily dependent on his ability to collect money from out-of-state donors he has courted during his years in Congress.

Lt. Gov. James "Duke" Aiona, the likely Republican nominee, would also benefit from more out-of-state money, but Democrats don't regard him as nearly the same threat as Lingle.

The Judiciary Commiittee also removed a $1,000 cap on corporate contributions to political action committees, which Democratic Rep. Della Au Belatti described as "a huge step backwards" for campaign finance reform.

Judiciary Chairman Jon Riki Karamatsu called it an issue of "making sure that all the transparency is there and making sure limitations are the same across the board."

I call it cheating to change the rules from election to election to put your party in the most advantageous possible position.

So far this session, Democrats seem more interested in securing their own personal and political financial security than dealing with the financial crisis that is crushing their constituents.

While we await the arrival of Santa and Barack Obama, there's still plenty of fodder for a "flASHback" on the week's news that amused and confused:

• U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Lloyd King is outraged that go! airlines wants to change its name to Aloha. I don't blame him. It's like the Big Bad Wolf changing his name to Grandma.

• Local Democrats will hold a VIP gala to celebrate Obama's inauguration, and the dress is "island elegant." For men, that means T-shirts with tuxedos printed on and for women, tank tops that say, "Proud to be Awesome."

• Visitors are touring the Honolulu school Obama attended, the condo he lived in, the ice cream parlor he scooped for and the hospital where conspiracists say he wasn't born. Nothing funny yet, but the nasty e-mails I'll get from conspiracists will be.

• A California company is proposing a $1 billion network of battery stations to charge electric cars in Hawai'i. Costco will amp up your ride for only $750 million if you don't mind waiting in long lines.

• Convicted child molester Frank Lefrandt Jr. fled to avoid prison just as child sex offender Michael Andrew Stephens was captured in Mexico after 15 years on the lam. This isn't how we want to balance our exports and imports.

• A national report gave Hawai'i a C-minus in preparing high school students for college. We'd do better if they weren't so picky about reading, math and science.

• A travel survey picked Hawaii as the top dream escape, ahead of London, Paris, Aruba, New York City, Las Vegas, Jamaica, Rome, the Bahamas and Tahiti. If dreams were airplane tickets, our economy would soar.

• The University of Hawai'i-Hilo hopes to become a research center for NASA missions to the moon because of the island's lunar-like landscape. And they've got plenty of pakalolo to negate the effects of gravity.

• HMSA has a new way for patients to consult with doctors by computer. That's definitely how I'm getting my next prostate exam.

• June Jones finished a 1-11 season at SMU with a 28-12 loss to Southern Miss while the rebuilding UH Warriors claimed a bowl berth without him. You know what they say in Texas — big hat, no cattle.

And the quote of the week ...

... from Prosecutor Peter Carlisle on how people are drinking at home instead of going to bars in the bad economy:

"It leads to less carnage on the highways, but can lead to more carnage on the domestic environment."

Carnage was always market neutral.