Andrew Sullivan linked today to a press conference from San Diego's Republican mayor, Jerry Sanders, who announced this week that he will now support gay marriage. The video clip is definitely worth watching.

Sanders' remarks were a pleasant surprise. In fact, he got elected after promising voters in 2005 that he would oppose same-sex marriage, and would use his veto power if the San Diego City Council took steps to go beyond civil unions.

With that in mind, when council members voted 5 to 3 recently on a resolution endorsing gay marriage, most expected the mayor to reject the measure. But then a funny thing happened -- Sanders decided he wanted his lesbian daughter to have the same marriage rights as everyone else.

A tearful Mayor Jerry Sanders made a dramatic shift yesterday, explaining that he can no longer oppose same-sex marriages because he does not want to deny justice to people like his daughter, who is a lesbian.

Joined at a late afternoon news conference by his wife, Rana Sampson, the San Diego mayor announced he will back a City Council decision to support same-sex marriage before the state Supreme Court, where California's ban on it awaits review.

"I decided to lead with my heart, which is probably obvious at the moment," said Sanders, moments before he revealed his daughter's sexual orientation.

I think there's a pattern here for conservatives and their social attitudes. They don't mind restrictions on free speech, until they have something provocative to say. They want to restrict reproductive rights, until someone close to them has an unwanted pregnancy. They want to break down the church-state wall, until they feel like their faith is in the minority. They want to treat embryos as people, until they suffer from an ailment that could benefit from stem-cell research.

And they balk at the idea of equal rights for gay people, until it's their daughter who is looking for equality.

The key to social change in this country seems fairly straightforward: wait for conservatives to have more life experience.